Minister of State for Health and Population at UN ICPD meeting

Written by UN Nepal Mission

Monday, 12 October 2009 13:28

Press Release

Hon. Minister of State for Health and Population Mr. Khadka Bahadur Bashyal participated in the United Nations General Assembly Commemorative meeting on the fifteenth anniversary of the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD), which was held in Cairo in 1994, today in New York.

Stressing that the implementation of the Cairo Plan of Action would contribute directly to the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) to reduce poverty, hunger, poor health, HIV/AIDS and to promote gender equality, Hon Minister said that some successes have been made in translating the commitments we made into policies and action programmes. But much remains to be done. At this point in time, he said that the best way to commemorate ICPD is to making a pragmatic and constructive analysis of achievements, of constraints, of lessons learned so as to enrich and accelerate the implementation of the Plan of action.

Highlighting the formidable challenges the Least developed countries like Nepal are facing to delivering population and health care services, Hon Minister said that Nepal has undertaken various measures to implement the commitments made in Cairo, including the adoption of national population policy to reduce the population growth rate and regulate migration, addressing poverty reduction goals focusing on social inclusion, women empowerment, equality, access to and utilization of health care services.

Informing the meeting about the increment of health budget by about 15 to 20 percent each year in the last three years in Nepal, he said that Nepal has been focussing on increasing income generating activities, improve women's status and easy access to basic education and reproductive health and family planning services and enhancing the governance of the health sector so that quality health care reaches to the people of remote mountains and villages in Nepal.

Stating the implementation of the Beijing Action Plan and National Action Plan on Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women and controlling girl trafficking in Nepal, Hon Minister said that support has been provided in skill development of single women for their social and economic empowerment, mechanisms relating to gender budgeting have been initiated and involvement of women in the formulation and implementation of local development programs has been institutionalized. Hon. Minister said that one third of the Nepal's 601 Constituent Assembly members are women and Nepalese Parliament passed a resolution that in all State mechanism women's participation has to be 33%.

Stating that the Government of Nepal has prepared a long term Population Perspective Plan (PPP) (2010-2031) to serve as a key guide to mainstream ICPD issues in sectoral plans, policies and programmes, Hon. Minister said that though we are acutely aware that the present global financial crisis makes our task of providing basic reproductive health care to our citizens much more difficult but long-term and predictable financing is a must to developing countries especially least developed and countries emerging from conflicts for complementing their national endeavours to meet health related MDGs. On behalf of the Hon. Minister of State, Secretary of Ministry of Health and Population Dr. Praveen Mishra delivered the statement.

Permanent Mission of Nepal to the United Nations

New York

12 October, 2009

Permanent Mission of Nepal to the United Nations

820 Second Avenue, Suite 17-B

New York, NY 10017

Tel: 1 (212) 370 3988 / 3989

Fax: 1 (212) 953 2038

E-mail: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Website: http://nepal.un.int

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