Family planning boost

A United Nations agency will be pushing the work of the Barbados Family Planning Association (BFPA) during a major population summit in Nairobi, Kenya next month.

Executive Director of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) Dr Natalia Kanem, who was recently in Barbados for consultations with Government officials, the BFPA and a number of young female entrepreneurs, lauded the social work being done among girls and women here.

And she has pledged to “noise it abroad” when she attends the global leaders’ conference which will discuss a previously unfulfilled pledge by heads to end gender-based violence and the idea that women and girls must be at the centre of any strategy to improve the world and reach the various sustainable development goals.

“We also are very pleased that the Population Commission in Barbados is going to be looking at the policy issues which we feel are part of the success stories of the girls I have met here. They are making jobs for themselves. They are getting the vocational training the BFPA provides,” Dr Kanem said in an interview at UN House, Hastings, Christ Church.

“These are the types of positive things…when I go to Nairobi next month I want to make sure the world knows what’s happening in Barbados,” she added.

The UNFPA Executive Director also praised Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley for her leadership here and on the world stage, describing Mottley as an icon, referring to her recent speeches at the UN General Assembly.

While commending the country for the socio-economic progress it is making, Dr Kanem believes much more can be done.

“I see a lot of opportunity to accelerate the progress…all of us working together as the United Nations to make sure none of us is left behind. When I think of the sustainable development goals, they belong to young people of this country, of this region, really, all around the world,” she said.

The UN official noted that those goals must occur in a climate of peace and of human rights.

She contended that the goals do not reside on paper, but in small communities across Barbados where all are equal.