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school enrolment, literacy rates, the growth in technical education. and the development of scientific skills, much progress has been achieved. (See Table 4–4)
III. A POLICY FRAMEWORK
32. Excessive population growth diffuses the fruits of development over increasing numbers instead of improving living standards in many developing countries; a reduction of current growth rates is an imperative for sustainable development. The critical issues are the balance between population size and available resources and the rate of population growth in relation to the capacity of the economy to provide for the basic needs of the population, not just today but for generations. Such a long-term view is necessary because attitudes to fertility rarely change rapidly and because, even after fertility starts declining, past increases in population impart a momentum of growth as people reach child-bearing age. However a nation proceeds towards the goals of sustainable development and lower fertility levels, the two are intimately linked and mutually reinforcing.
33. Measures to influence population size cannot be effective in isolation from other environment/development issues. The number, density, movement, and growth rate of a population cannot be influenced in the short run if these efforts are being overwhelmed by adverse broader focus than controlling numbers: Measures to improve the quality of human resources in terms of health, education, and social development are as important.
34. A first step may be for governments to abandon the false division between 'productive' or 'economic' expenditures and 'social' expenditures, Policymakers must realize that spending on population activities and on other efforts to raise human potential is crucial to a nation's economic and productive activities and to achieving sustainable human progress – the end for which a government exists.
1.Managing Population Growth
35. Progress in population policies is uneven. Some countries with serious population problems have comprehensive policies. Some go no further than the promotion of family planning. Some do not do even that.
36. A population policy should set out and pursue broad national demographic goals in relation to other socio-economic objectives. Social and cultural factors dominate all others in affecting fertilily. The most important of these is the roles women play in the family, the economy. and the society at large. Fertility rates fall a women's employment opportunities outside the hope and farm, their access to education, and their age at marriage all rise. Hence policies meant to lower fertility rates not only must include economic incentives and disincentives, but
