As the UN ESCAP is holding the Asia Pacific Population Conference this week in Bangkok, Thailand, we take the opportunity to look back at the milestones we have crossed with ICPD and MDGs and start thinking about what lies beyond. How will we defend sexual and reproductive rights during the negotiations for sustainability and population stabilization ?

As we know, the ICPD held in Cairo in 1994 marked the acceptance of a new paradigm in addressing human reproduction and health. For the first time, there was a clear focus on the needs of individuals and on the empowerment of women, and the emergence of an evolving discourse about the connection between human rights and health, linking new conceptions of health to the struggle for social justice and respect for human dignity.

This was a departure from the previous approach that treated women instrumentally, as tools through which to implement population programmes and policies.

Women’s reproductive capacity was transformed from an object of population control to a matter of women’s empowerment to exercise personal autonomy in relation to their sexual and reproductive health within their social, economic and political contexts. Women’s health in general, and their sexual and reproductive health in particular, are determined not only by their access to health services but by their status in society and pervasive gender discrimination.

The ICPD thus posits the human rights of women – their right to personal reproductive autonomy and to collective gender equality – as a primary principle in the development of reproductive health and population programs.

The Programme of Action adopted at the ICPD is a consensus document, the end product of a process of negotiation and compromise involving over 180 States.

Reproductive health is defined in paragraph 7.2 of the Programme of Action as “a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being … in all matters related to the reproductive system”, which “implies that people are able to have a satisfying and safe sex life and that they have the capability to reproduce and the freedom to decide if, when and how often to do so.”

Reproductive rights, according to the ICPD, “rest on the recognition of the basic right of all couples and individuals to decide freely and responsibly the number, spacing and timing of their children and to have the information and means to do so, and the right to attain the highest standard of sexual and reproductive health.”

Then along came the MDGs or the Millenium Development Goals in the year 2000.

They sound great ! What is the problem ?

Well, while the ICPD agenda broadened the spectrum of reproductive health and brought in the discourse on rights, the MDGs introduced later were merely indicators to monitor the progress and moreover completely missed a goal encompassing RH agenda of ICPD.

Therefore, RH is considered as a ‘missing link’ for MDGs. If at all we agree that the complex RH agenda of ICPD is present in MDGs, the broader issue of rights which was stitched with RH is clearly dropped in MDGs.

The maternal mortality reduction goal, for example, cannot be achieved without access to the full range of reproductive health services, and without empowerment of women.

After much advocacy and struggles, target 5B was introduced: Achieve, by 2015, universal access to reproductive health. Its indicators:

• Contraceptive prevalence rate
• Adolescent birth rate
• Antenatal care coverage (at least one visit and at least four visits)
• Unmet need for family planning

In the meanwhile, the world is undergoing seismic changes in its structure, function and interactions. New forces are emerging which start to redefine societies and position the entire world as a one market and everything else is subordinated to market forces and economic policies. Whether we like it or not, concepts like globalization, neoliberalism, tax havens, foreign debt, IMF, WTO are all words that we need to understand as health rights advocates!

We will report back from the APCC about what the vision for the future holds! Watch this space, and to get our tweets from the conference follow @asapasia and the event’s hashtags #appc , #appc6  and #appcyouth .