Islamabad, July 11: President General Pervez
Musharraf today vowed to "vigorously" arrest Pakistan's
population explosion with the launch of the country's
first-ever population control policy.
"Pakistan cannot be pulled out of the poverty trap with
three million additional births every year," he declared at a
function to mark world population day in the capital.
The new policy aims to bring Pakistan's population growth
rate down to 1.6 from the current 2.1 percent by 2012.
"We want regular monitoring of population growth to
achieve the target of 1.6 percent by the year 2012," he said.
"Efforts to bring down the birth rate must be pursued
vigorously through sound population management."
Pakistan's mostly Muslim population currently stands a
more than 145 million.
The country is now ranked the world's sixth most
populous nation after China, India, the United States,
Indonesia and Brazil, and ahead of Japan, Bangladesh, Nigeria and Russia.
Experts believe if the boom is not arrested, Pakistan'
population could double in the next 33 years.
Musharraf, who seized power in a bloodless coup in 1999
and prolonged his presidency by five years in a referendum
earlier this year, said the country's population agenda would
take the centre stage of his development programme.
The military ruler also advocated introducing family
planning into the country's formal and informal education
curricula.
He expressed satisfaction that "presently 30 million
couples are practising family planning."
Bureau Report
