On May 11, at 5:05 AM, India's population reached one billion with the birth of Ashta Arora. The newborn was immediately swarmed by about 200 journalists, some of whom had to be beaten back from the mother's bed with truncheons. The count may not have been exact, but the occasion gave many pause for thought. Every day, 42,000 children are born in India. Since 1948, when the newly formed Indian government began trying to reduce the rate of population increase, population has tripled. The increase is generally among the lower class, where children are considered a hedge against poverty in old age, and where birth control is virtually nonexistant. By 2050, it's estimated that India's population will reach 1.5 billion, and at that point it is also expected to surpass China as the world's most populous country.

The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) was developed to combat the overpopulation problem by promoting birth control in India and other developing countries. Formed in 1969, it emphasizes family planning and sex education as a way of controlling population growth in poorer countries where birth rates are increasing. It tries to spread its message on a local level, in response to immediate problems and social pressures. In Honduras, for instance, the UNFPA is setting up reproductive health clinics, which will educate sexually active single women who aren't currently using contraceptives on how to do so. In Zimbabwe, where AIDS infects about 25 percent of the population, peer programs teach young people about "safe sex."

Anti-abortion activists consider the UN's programs a misappropriation of funds which proselytizes birth control and abortion. Since 1995 the international family planning budget has been cut each year by Congress. Led by Chris Smith (R-NJ), several Republican Senators attached a provision to last year's UN debt payment bill requiring that the United States not grant any money to the UNFPA or any groups that "perform abortions or lobby for liberalized abortion laws internationally." Currently, only $15 million out of the $372.5 million international family-planning budget can be given to non-governmental organizations, such as UNFPA. President Clinton, who has objected to these cutbacks, yet accepted them, in the past, is now asking for a $169 million increase in funding for overseas family planning programs.

On One Hand...

The UNFPA and other family planning organizations are telling us all that the world would be a little bit better if there weren't so many poor people. That's a little like saying New York City would be better if there weren't so many bums. It diverts attention away from the essential injustice of the 20th century: we have more than enough resources to feed everyone, and we have the technology to distribute them. The anti-overpopulation activists who advocate sterilization and birth control in "less desirable" countries are avoiding the uncomfortable truth: there'd be room enough for all of us, if some of us stopped consuming so much. Instead of spending money to limit the population in less developed countries, we would be better advised to help those who are now living by reigning in our own excesses and offering our assistance.

On the Other Hand...

Every minute, according to the UNPFA, about 160 unwanted children are born, usually to mothers who are unable to make their own reproductive choices simply because they haven't been given the information necessary. The United States, as an ambassador of modern practices, should take every opportunity to educate women abroad, so that they have the ability to control their health, their development, and their reproductive ability. By educating women and giving them a role in planning families, the UNFPA and other family-planning organizations are offering an alternative to unsafe abortion.

• President Clinton recently called on Congress to raise aid for international family planning by $169 million bext year, bringing the total to $541 million in the 2001 budget. That increase would bring funding to 1995 levels.

• According to a study by the Government Accounting Office during the 1970s, widespread sterilization abuse was found in four areas served by the HIS (Indian Health Services). In 1975 alone, some 25,000 native American women were permanently sterilized - many after being coerced, misinformed, or threatened. One former HIS nurse reported the use of tubal ligation on "uncooperative" or "alchoholic" women in the 1990s.

• The Foreign Appropriations bill before the Congress allows the United States to pay nearly $1 billion in arrears to the U.N. on the condition that punives restrictions be placed on U.S. aid to foreign family-planning programs.

• In India, the experiment with the forced population control in the mid-1970s led to the collapse of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi's government. The memory of millions of people being hauled off to sterilization camps has since left a lasting negative image of birth control among the public, according to S. Ghosh, the current population official.

• Nearly 600,000 women die annually from complications of pregnancy and childbirth.

• On April 4, the UNPFA received about $57 million from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to fight the spread of AIDS.

• In several African countries, girls aged 15-19 are five to six times more likely to be HIV-positive than boys their own age, indicating a critical need to empower adolescent girls, in particular, with the information and means to avoid infection. In many of these countries, even raising the issue of condom use is difficult, since condoms are associated with promiscuity, infidelity, and prostitution.