Khaled Abdel Ghaffar, Egypt’s Minister of Health and Population, announced Global Conference on Population, Health, and Development preparations during a press conference.
President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi will oversee the September 5–8 summit.
International organisations, diplomats, Ministry of Health and Population officials, and local and foreign media attended the news conference.
Abdel Ghaffar stressed that population expansion hurts development, per capita expenditure on education, healthcare, and housing, and water and agricultural land.
Egypt is the fourteenth most populated nation in the world with over 105 million inhabitants, thus he underlined the need of analysing the demographic situation and its future effects.
Abdel Ghaffar also said that Egypt’s birth rate has dropped from 2.7 million in 2014 to 2.183 million in 2022.
The overall fertility rate dropped to 2.85 children per woman in 2021 from 3.5 in 2014. He predicted 66.4% family planning in 2021, up from 58.5% in 2014.
The minister said that the world population would reach 8.5 billion by 2030 and 9.7 billion by 2050. Eight countries—including Egypt—will account for nearly half of this increase.
UNRC Elena Panova noted Egypt’s health, population, and development accomplishments.
She also stressed that the upcoming International Conference on Population, Health, and Development is a crucial opportunity for Egypt and the region to find a way to provide equitable access to health services and leverage the demographic dividend.
Decision-makers, ministers of health and population from different countries, ambassadors, international partner agencies, UN and USAID, banking entities, entrepreneurs, the media, civil society representatives, intellectuals, and sponsors of success partners will attend the conference.
The meeting will debate the expert-developed population plan. Studying other nations’ methods helps find the best one for Egypt.