Disentrapment programs - the crunch!
A few hesitant first steps!
The problems faced by disentrapment program in Africa are: (1) Africa's population which this set to exceed its carrying capacity more than five times within 150 years, that is within two potential lifetimes - see. This is the result of mothers in Middle Africa having more than six children - their present Total Fertility Rate or TFR is 6.3. (2) The impossibility of economic development being fast enough to compensate for such a high maternal fertility - even were all the economic constraints on development removed. (3) Falling soil fertility, apparently almost everywhere in Africa -see. -see (3) The difficulty of at least 2 billion people being able to emigrate. see
Failure to face these four problems can only result in it starvation and violence on an unprecedented scale.
The daunting nature of these problems is such that demography, development economics, and the UN agencies, particularly UNDP, bury their heads in the sand, and refuse to think about them! They apply the Hardinian taboo and the so-called Iron-age taboos. This taboo is so strong that it there was no word for 'disentrapment', so it had to be invented.
Chinese experience with disentrapment. Although never labeled as such, China's one 1-child family programme was the world's first 'disentrapment programme', since it was the logical response to its rapidly rising population, and the consequent 'grain problem'. It was the Chinese answer to the dilemma: "Are 1-child families better than starvation and perhaps violence?" China thought they were. China is now disentrapping itself at least as much by its rapid economic development, as by its vigorous fertility reduction.
Since China's has been the only disentrapment programme so far, experience is limited. Unfortunately, the countries of Africa are not in nearly such as good a position as China was, to undergo rapid economic development, and disentrap themselves that way.
China was able to start its 1-child family programme, because at that time it represented a distinct culture, sharply separated culturally from the West. It was therefore not subject to the Hardinian taboo, and particularly not to Demon 6 - that of 1-child families.
A Frequently Asked Question: Population densities in Middle Africa are much less than those of the Netherlands. Why then is population a problem in Africa? Answer. The economic development of the Netherlands, and its export and import links with the rest of the world, were developed over hundreds of years, during a time when fertility was much lower, and mortality much higher, and population growth therefore much slower, than it presently is in Africa. Population would indeed be no problem in Africa, if it had this level of economic development, and these links. The problem is that neither can be achieved fast enough to catch up with a total fertility of six children per mother.
The essential first step is for demography, development economics, and the UN agencies, to lift the Hardinian taboo, to look fearlessly at the entrapment of particular communities - and to encourage governments to do so too. Which communities are demographically trapped? And to what degree? Mercifully, there signs that it is beginning to lift. See
The second essential step is for the predicament of trapped communities to be debated globally - especially by the villagers most seriously involved - AND by the high resource consumers of the North - in the context of reduced resource consumption and sustainable lifestyles in the North. Entrapment in the South can only be discussed if resource consumption in the North, and particularly its contribution to global warming, is discussed at the same time. see At present this website has very little on Northern lifestyles, this imbalance will be corrected as soon as possible - and links provided to other websites at dealing with this problem in more detail. There is, alas, a limit to what one person can do!
The third essential step is the need for massive development aid. The scale of this has, for example, to be measured against the $23 billion allocated for the development of the new US Joint Strike Fighter.
Measures for disentrapmentAll measures for disentrapment will have to be exploited - insofar as these are possible.
Increasing carrying capacity - the problem is to prevent it falling further, since soil fertility is presently falling so widely in Africa.
Increasing economic development. The problem is to increase it fast enough to catch up with a total fertility of six children per mother - and to provide them with schools, hospitals, jobs and essential imports, particularly food.
It is taken for granted that all the external constraints on development must be removed - especially the abolition of all debt, and the removal of all tariffs on exports from Africa, etc. However, these measures will not by themselves promote economic development which is fast enough to compensate for high fertility. For countries like, say Malawi, the prospects of an export-led economy are remote.
In addition, there is the problem that so many of the simple manufactured exports (hardware, etc), which Africa might be making, are currently made by the China, which has the advantage of having both 'hi-tech', and low-wage economies, within the same huge country. In effect, 'Africa has lost the export bus in competition with China' - at least for the present. It is therefore most important to accept the conclusion that economic development - by itself - cannot be sufficiently fast in Africa for disentrapment - at the present time.
The current 'development paradigm' (way of thinking, mind-set) is that development can officially be fast enough, when many development economists know perfectly well privately that it cannot be. In this respect development economics and 'the current development paradigm', is like demography - CORRUPT!! - but never the individual colleagues!see See again the so-called Iron Age taboo.
Increasing migration. There already has been much migration from Africa, and there should be more. However, Africa's carrying capacity is about 500 million people, and yet it's population is projected to reach 2.8 billion by 2150. Its population is therefore set to multiply to five times in excess of its present carrying capacity. However, if soil fertility continues to fall, its as seems likely, its carrying capacity may become less than 500 million people. At least 2 billion people, will therefore have to fed with indefinitely with imported food - either by trade, or more likely by aid. Or they will have to emigrate - if starvation and violence are to be avoided. Neither of these possibilities seems likely to be completely practical. It seems therefore that most disentrapment will have to take place in Africa by sharply reduced fertility.
Reducing fertility is likely to be the major means of disentrapment, especially in communities where it is very high, as in Niger, with a total fertility rate of eight children per mother- a TFR of 8.
A Frequently Asked Question. Surely, if every mother were to immediately have only two children, one to replace her, and one to replace her husband, the population would immediately remain the the same size? Answer: Alas no!
Population momentum. Unfortunately, if, in a very young community, all mothers where instantly to have only two children, the population would not immediately stay the same size - it would still about double. This is the population momentum inherent in young communities ( it is also known as demographic momentum). At present, few non-demographers understand it - everyone needs to do so. Here is a description taken from Primary Mother Care
POPULATION MOMENTUM - ONE. Momentum is the movement that you give a ball when you kick it. It rolls by its own momentum, using the remains of the kick you gave it. Young populations are the same. They keep on growing, even if the force of their growth (fertility) suddenly stops and falls to 2. So a rapidly growing young population takes many years to become stable (stay the same size), even if it reaches replacement fertility immediately - which is difficult. This mother has 4 children and 2 daughters. If they each had 2 daughters the population would double. In this figure we only think about daughters. The sons will be the husbands of the daughters of other mothers.
POPULATION MOMENTUM - TWO. Populations can be divided into age groups - babies and young children 0-5 years, older children 5-10 years, schoolchildren 10-15 years, teenagers 15-20 years..., etc. These age groups can be drawn as pyramids (‘mountains') with old people at the top and children at the bottom. Each age group makes a piece of the pyramid. Populations in the South, especially in Africa have many children, so the bottom of the pyramid is large. Populations in the North, as in Europe and Japan, have few children. So the bottom of the pyramid is narrow.
If all mothers(South, North, and ‘X') were to immediately have 2 children only from now on, their populations would in the end stay the same size.
Before that happens the populations in the North would get smaller, and populations in the South would get larger. Only‘Country X' would stay the same size. This is because Country ‘X.' has the same number of people in the age groups that could bear children, or could be going to bear them. If all mothers were to immediately have two children only, ‘Country X' would stay the same size immediately. There is no real ‘Country X'. It is only an example.
The North has fewer people in the younger age groups. If all mothers were to immediately have two children only, it would start to get smaller immediately.
The South has many more people (children) in the younger age groups. If all mothers were to immediately have 2 children only, populations in the South would go on growing for many years before they stopped - population momentum. This is a big problem in Africa.
Besides showing the proportion (percentage) this figure also shows the absolute numbers. For example there are about 300 million girls aged 0-5 in the South and only about 30 million in the North - a tenth that number.
1-child families
Remarkably, 1-child families can be discussed in Africa. I wrote an article for the Uganda Monitor entitled: Will Uganda follow Rwanda? This is an important question, since Uganda's TFR is still 7 children per mother. The Ugandan editor took away my title and replaced it with his own: Go for 1-kid families or the [population] bomb will hit Uganda. Note that this was the his title not mine ! I think that this is kind of dialogue that should open immediately in all trapped communities. Where the dialogue gets to be is where it gets to, but at least it should open. It will surely get to different places in different communities" .
So how is the need for one child families best communicated?
Firstly, should one aim for 1-child families as the immediate target, or should there be an intermediate stage when 2-child families is the target - even though population momentum would still result in a very young community doubling?
John Guillebaud argues for a stage approach to 1-child families.John Guillebaud's two stages towards 1-child families ? He argues like this:
"As a world, we are still far from the critical first stage which is to provide good contraceptive services to everyone who wants them - and without any talk of incentives and disincentives for fertility reduction, since they are unnecessary at this stage, and may be counterproductive (as in the Sanjay Gandhi debacle of 1974....) This stage promotes a 2-child norm by education and vigorously through the media. It needs a name, so let us call it Guillebaud Stage One ."
"Only after the critical first stage has been reached, when everyone has access to contraceptives, would it be appropriate to think about a second stage or Guillebaud Stage Two in which there would be all-inclusive discussion as to whether the people might accept the appropriate incentives and disincentives to promote vigorous fertility reduction, and particularly 1-child families. I think that we should - for the moment not be proactive about the final step of 1-child families, until Stage One has been achieved.
"However, if at any time the local community decide that population reduction should be more vigorous, we can of course support them."
"I think that we should persuade African leaders that the target for their countries during Stage One should initially be a total fertility of two children (a TFR of 2) - as soon as possible ! It is, after all, 4 children less than the 6 children most mothers now have ! This should be achieved voluntarily by the immediate provision of contraceptive services and supplies."
"The immediate discussion of 1-child families is much too radical because: 1) It distorts family structures, as in the cities of China, with their dearth of girls. 2) It risks such a fierce backlash from the "politically correct" who argue that every couple surely has the right to at least replace themselves! As a result, there may in practice be less progress than with a TFR of 2 as the initial target."
"In Rwanda, for example, even a TFR of 2 is considered 'amazing'. In a very well-attended family planning seminar I ran in August 2001, a (Protestant!) bishop was bragging about his small well-planned family of 5! - and it was indeed smaller than those of all the older people present!"
"Moreover the intrinsic logic of a couple exactly replacing themselves is easy to explain . "2-child" = TFR 2 also rings bells with many audiences as being what would be the obvious policy (later) in any society in the steady state, however stabilization was achieved." [This neglects population momentum in a young community where a TFR of 2 would cause the population to double !!]
I reply that different messages are needed for different audiences. "Although entrapment is a sad reality, adaptation to it may - on occasion - need to be gradual, and adapted to particular groups, such as those in this list. These first two levels are more or less identical, since once the demographers had started discussing entrapment (openly!), the development economists would have to follow suit."
"1. The demographers, must 'discorrupt' their discipline and start thinking about entrapment - it is after all demographic entrapment. This requires that they reinstate Malthus. see
"2. The development economists are as much to blame for not facing up to entrapment as the demographers, so they too must come to terms with it They let it be assumed that there is going to be economic development, when there is no reasonable hope of it happening fast enough for disentrapment. See the so-callled Iron Age taboo.
"3. The UN agencies, particularly UNFPA and UNDP, must incorporate entrapment in their thinking. Once the development economists had started discussing entrapment, the UN agencies would have to follow suit."
"4. Governments need to follow what the UN agencies suggest they do."
"5. The human rights movement must start debating the legitimate incentives and disincentives for fertility reduction under conditions of entrapment - something which it has never yet done."
"6. Professionals in the developing world - the intelligentsia - especially health workers. This is where the importance of discussing entrapment in Primary Mother Care comes in."
"7. The community This is the interesting level. I discussed this with Donald Arden the retired Archbishop of Malawi - a wonderfully wise man, and a superb servant of Malawi . "... entrapped?... we have long known this in our guts... 1-child families?... of course the dialogue should open... it won't get very far, but at least it should open...."
"I think the Archbishop has got it right - at least the dialogue should open. As to not getting very far, it may not get very far in the short term, but what about the longer term? If it doesn't at least open, it will certainly get nowhere!"
Can and villagers discuss their own disentrapment?
Imagine a dialogue going like this:
"We villagers have too little land and our gardens are becoming too small. We have nowhere to go, there are no jobs in town, and the government has no money."
"If we go on having six children there will be even less land for each of them, and they will become even more stunted and starving. What can we do to persuade one another to have two children only, or perhaps one child only? What incentives and disincentives [this complex notion would have to be explained] do we agree that the government should help us to apply to one another?"
This of course begs all sorts of questions, but it does at least open the dialogue on what might be a useful way forward. I think that it should at least be given it a try. I am much heartened by the opinion of these three experts:
Three experts
"...most people, however uneducated, are far from stupid... they may be counted upon to be interested in understanding the nature of situations that present problems in terms of their own values, and to seek solutions to such problems".
Frank Notestein (1954) {31}
"Neither evidence nor analysis has yet disproved the notion that the poor in poor countries know, at least in a rough manner, what is in their self interest".
Partha Dasgupta (1995){29}
"My long years of practice in underpriviledged communities have always impressed me with the ability of poor illiterate women to cope and make sound decisions for themselves and their families".
Mahmoud Fathalla (1998){61}
Postscript
I have recently taken on a bet with the editor of The Lancet, of a very large bottle of champagne, that the next Conference on Population and Development - if there ever is one see - will be on the theme of "A 1- Child World". Since, with AIDS, Malawi needs a 2-child target, and since communities, such as Italy, feel they might disappear with the 1-child target, perhaps the theme of the next conference should be that of "A 1-or-2-Child World". If so, who gets the champagne?
Diplomatically, the initiative now lies with China. Future historians will see its 1-child families as the greatest of its many great achievements.