Alexis Dougherty
Mr. Davis
Period 3
15 December 2008
Women’s’ Education: Paving the path to solving Overpopulation in
Third World Countries
Imagine living in a world where you are constantly surrounded by thousands of
other people and you always have a minimal amount of space to yourself. Then picture
worrying about whether or not you will have clean water or there will be enough food to
eat. Today the approximate world population is about 6.7 billion people (Current). It is
estimated that by 2050 the world population of humans will be around 9.4 billion, since
the global human population increases at a rate of 1,000,000 people every 4 days
(Current). This is a huge issue because with a population explosion comes huge
consequences such as environmental degradation, hunger, poor sanitation, disease, health
issues, and lack of adequate natural resources that all result from overpopulation (Berg).
One factor contributing greatly to this problem is the high birth rates of developing
regions such as India, the Middle East, South America and Africa (Berg). In these
countries people are having more children due to cultural traditions, religious beliefs, lack
of family planning, lower marriage ages, and out of fear that their children will die
(Berg). Thus, the totally fertility rate of women is much higher ranging from 3-5 children
per woman in developing countries than n developed countries where the total fertility
rate averages about 1.5 children per woman (Berg). This is mostly due to the fact that
woman have a much lower economic and social status in developing countries and do not
choose when they will become pregnant. The UNFPA or the United Nations Population
Fund is currently working to expand the availability of contraceptives to women in
developing countries in order to give them the option of having safe and wanted
pregnancies (Family). Also groups such as the Human Rights First Organization are
working to establish human rights throughout the world population and give women
equal opportunities (Minteer, Personal Interview: 5 December 2008). If women are given
equal opportunities and countries become more developed then the total fertility rates will
decline because women will marry later and focus more on their education such as in
developed countries (Berg). One major effort to increase education for women is
provided by the United Nations Girls’ Education Initiative (UNGEI), which was created
in 2000, and works with governments of developing countries as they meet their goals of
expanding education and establishing gender equality for every child (www.ungei.org).
Also Governments of developing countries such as Mexico, with financial aide from
more established nations, have established reforms in education, family planning, and
health care to stabilize the regions population (Berg). The most effective ways that have
been implemented to solve the issue of over-population in developing nations are;
funding girls education, increasing the availability of family planning services, and
working with third world governments to improve the overall health care systems of the
countries. Out of these three solutions the most inexpensive, least complicated, and most
influential is the funding of girls education. This solution must be established prior to
building family planning services, and improving health services otherwise all work
efforts will fail.
The funding of girls education is the most inexpensive way to solve the problem
of over population in third world countries. There are numerous organizations, such as
The Girls Global Education Fund (GGEF) and The United Nations Girls Education
Initiative (UNGEI), in the process of helping improve women’s education in poor
countries. These organizations are non-profit and work to give girls equal opportunities to
attend school and fund them with a well-rounded education. Organizations for women’s
education, work in global, regional and national levels, which provide funding
specifically for the advancement of equal gender opportunities (What is Ungei). Having
money contributed from around the globe to support the cause makes a huge impact and
cuts away at the expense of the individual organization that pays to put girls in schools.
These organizations also help the individual country have the ability to educate women
without much expense. The funding of girls education is extremely inexpensive in
comparison to providing birth control and changing countries entire health care systems.
One goal of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) is to provide universal access
to reproductive health services by the year 2015 (Family). This is a huge goal and will be
extremely costly because there is immense work and effort put into the production of
contraceptives and research for new methods of birth control. Providing young girls with
books, school supplies, and a teacher is far less expensive than distributing birth control
to an entire region, while working to improve contraceptive methods. The most expensive
solution out of the three is the improvement of countries health care systems. In order for
a health care system to be adequate it must obtain technical competence. Technical
competence refers to the abilities, performance, and actual capability of health care
providers to carry out specific tasks clinically and non- clinically (DiPrete). The cost to
put a whole village of adults through the proper training and education to become health
care providers is unimaginable even without factoring in the expense of medical
equipment and supplies. Before this solution can be made into a reality, poor countries
must first take the less expensive route to educate women so they can run their health
care facilities.
Out of the three solutions the funding of girls education is the least complicated
and easiest to bring forth change in the issue of overpopulation in third world countries.
Women make up 80 percent of the world’s illiterate population (Status). This is wrong
because sending young girls to school is an obligation, but the governments and families
in developing countries simply cannot afford it (Status). If organizations work to fund the
education of women by sending them to school, women could gain status in their
communities, and have more choices in their lives, rather than just becoming
homemakers. This process is much less complicated than distributing family planning
services and creating better health care systems. Family planning is deeply frowned upon
in many regions often because of cultural and religious values (Family). It is hard to
provide women with methods of contraceptives when their husbands and community are
against it and women have little say in their family’s decision- making (Family). Women
must first gain status in their communities and at home by having an education so they
can make decisions for themselves and not have their husbands decide how many kids
they will have. Once women are supporting their families and have more control, they
will be able to have easy access to family planning services. It is also far too complicated
to create a new health system in these countries because there is a lot of effort that must
be put forth to establish it. “Dramatic increases in health coverage has been reported by
most countries, many of which have posted modest declines in infant and child mortality,
however not enough has been done to assess service quality or to ensure resources are
having an optimal impact” (DiPrete). Healthcare systems in developing countries must
have properly trained providers and also have modern performance standards.
Developing countries do not have enough educated men to bring about these drastic
changes in their health care systems nor do they have the money to adequately equip
them in order to treat people. Once women become educated and boost the economies of
their countries then the countries will be able to afford to pay for improving their health
care facilities. If educated women in these countries work to obtain degrees in the
medical field than these countries will be able to fill these healthcare facilities with an
educated force of men and women looking for medical careers.
The most influential way to bring control to the overpopulation of third world
countries is by educating girls. There is a vicious cycle taking place currently in these
countries because women are uneducated and getting married at younger ages, and
therefore having more children. “Without an education girls are consigned to a life of
poverty and limited choices. Most likely their daughters will also grow up without an
education, and the cycle will continue”(Status). In order to give these women more
choices in their lives we must educate them so they have more career oriented priorities.
The ability to obtain an education and pursue a career will allow women to marry later in
life and have fewer healthier children (Status). Once women gain an education then they
will be able to influence their country positively by being able to join the work force and
increase the productivity of their economy (Status). With the basis of having educated
women in the work force, the economies of developing countries will improve and these
countries will be able to afford to provide adequate health care and family planning
services to every one of its citizens and the extreme overpopulation problem will be
solved.
In order to solve the increasing problem of overpopulation in developing countries
women must be educated. When women are educated their priorities change from living
at home and having kids to being more focused on pursuing a career and developing
skills in their field of work. The funding of women’s education is inexpensive, less
complicated, and more influential compared to the other current solutions of distributing
family planning information, and improving health care systems. Also if this solution is
more focused on and comes through it will bring more positive effects to developing
countries. With the basis of women’s education in third world countries these other
solutions already being put forth to further the effort to end overpopulation will be more
effective. With women having control in their lives and economic status, developing
nations will flourish and be brought out from generations of severe poverty.
Works Cited
Berg, Linda R., David M. Hassenzahl, and Peter H. Raven. Environment. 6th ed. New
York: Wiley, 2008.
"Current World Population." www.worldometers.info. [2008.] Worldometers.info. 29
Nov.2008 <http://www.worldometers.info/population/>.
DiPrete Brown, Lori, Lynne Miller Franco, Nadwa Rafeh, and Theresa Hatzell. "Quality
"Family Planning: So that Every Pregnancy is Wanted." [Jan. 2008.] United Nations
Population Fund. 29 Nov. 2008 <http://www.unfpa.org/rh/planning.htm>.
Minteer, Krista. "Human Rights First: Mission and Views." Telephone interview. 7 Dec.
08.
"The status of Women and Girls." Girls Global Education Fund Program. 2008. Girls
Global. 11 Dec. 2008 <http://www.ggef.org/top.html>.
"What is Ungei? Vision and Mission." [31 July 2008.] UNGEI. 29 Nov. 2008
<http://www.ungei.org/whatisungei/index_211.html>.