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Resources For All People in the Balance | 2002 World Population Datasheet | Population, Health, Environment | Correcting Gender Myopia
This other wallchart from the Population Reference Bureau (PRB) provides information and data on critical linkages between people and the environment. Thirteen demographic, health, and environment indicators are given for 123 countries, six world regions, and the world as a whole. Accompanying text and graphics highlight trends in urbanization, population momentum, consumption levels, carbon dioxide emissions, changes in land use, and declining availability of fresh water. For more information about PRB go to http://www.prb.org. For a PDF version of the wallchart go to http://www.prb.org/pdf/MakingTheLinkPHE-be.pdf. "Correcting Gender Myopia -- Gender Equity, Women's Welfare, and the Environment"
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The future of the relationship between people and critical natural resources appears more hopeful than it has for some time.Human population growth is slowing. While slowing, however, significant growth continues, meaning that more people will be sharing such finite resources as freshwater and cropland. And in some regions – notably in sub-Saharan Africa and parts of Asia – large families and early pregnancies provide strong momentum for population growth that could continue for generations to come. But the braking of this growth has been significant enough that many analysts of natural resources are more optimistic about their future availability than they were in the early 1990s.This update to People in the Balance analyzes new data on population growth and the state of critical natural resources.
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Poverty fuels high birth rates in poor nations, as documented in the 2002 World Population Data Sheet, released by the Population Reference Bureau (PRB). Of the 41 countries designated as "heavily indebted poor countries" by the World Bank, 39 fall into the category of high-fertility nations, where women, on average, bear four or more children. Similarly, the 48 countries identified by the United Nations as "least developed" are expected to triple their populations by 2050. For more information about PRB go to 
At international conferences throughout the 1990s a new vision of women's health, welfare, and rights was created, acknowledging the fact that better lives for women means higher rates of child survival, lower fertility, lower (and declining) rates of population growth, and more efficient use of natural resources. Despite its potency, this vision has yet to be fully realized. Gender myopia -- blindness to the inequities between women and men -- still afflicts policymakers in national governments, international development agencies, and even some nongovernmental organizations. This paper reviews the state of the world's women along several dimensions, documents the links between women's welfare and population, and charts the progress (or its lack) in achieving the gender equity that must underlie any viable effort to achieve sustainability. For more information go to