A presentation looking at the SRHR goals and targets within the SDGs and comparing them with the ICPD, identifying gaps and making recommendations for the way forward.

1. SDGs and ICPD:
Exploring Linkages
and Strategizing
the Way Forward
to Achieve
SRHR for ALL
Sachini Perera
Asian-Pacific
Resource and
Research Centre for
Women (ARROW)

2. Truly Transformative?
• SDGs are being hailed as a truly transformative
development agenda
• Compared to the MDGs, the SDGs followed a more
inclusive and participatory process, includes more
issues and recognizes some intersections.
• However it is not-so-transformative compared to
certain previous instruments and documents.
– Rights are not as much in the forefront and center
– Non-Inclusion of diverse marginalised groups

3. SRHR in the SDGs
• Broadly captured under two goals
– Goal 3 HEALTH
– Goal 5 GENDER EQUALITY
• Goal 3
– Reducing maternal mortality ratio
– Ending preventable deaths of newborns
– Universal access to SRH services including family planning
– Ending AIDS and other communicable diseases
– Integration of reproductive health into national strategies and
programmes
• Goal 5
– Eliminating all forms of VAW and girls
– Eliminate all harmful practices, such as child, early and forced
marriage and female genital mutilation
– Universal access to SRH and RR in accordance with the ICPD
There is thinking that Comprehensive Sexuality Education could be
included under Goal 4 - Education

4. Reference to the ICPD PoA
• The SDGs refer to the UDHR, International Human
Rights treaties, to the Beijing Platform for Action and
the ICPD Programme of Action, among others.
• How is this important?
– They are all critical pieces we can bring together in order to
implement the SDGs more comprehensively and in a rights-based
way
– Access to safe abortion services
– Tackling coercive reproductive healthcare issues such as forced
sterilization

5. Background on the ICPD
• 1994 – the International Conference on Population and
Development in Cairo
• While ICPD has become synonymous with SRHR, it is a
document that is actually inclusive of all population and
development trends
• ICPD has undergone extensive national, regional and
global review processes (+5, +10, +15, +20)
• ICPD Beyond 2014 Review
– a Special Session of the General Assembly endorsed the findings
of the 20-year review
– GA Resolution – ICPD should continue until the Agenda is
achieved. Governments committed to intensified efforts to address
gaps and emerging challenges.
– Framework of Actions for the follow-up to the ICPD PoA (also
builds on the outcome documents from three major thematic ICPD
reviews – on youth, human rights and women’s health)

6. ICPD PoA
• Chapter 4
– Gender Equality, Equity and Empowerment of Women
• Empowerment and status of women
• The girl child
• Male responsibilities and participation
• Chapter 5
– The Family, its roles, rights, structure and composition
• Diversity of family structure and composition
• Chapter 6
– Population Growth and Structure
• Fertility, mortality and population growth rates
• Children and youth, Elderly people, Indigenous people, People with Disabilities
• Chapter 7
– Reproductive Rights and Health
• Family Planning
• STIs/HIV
• Human sexuality and gender relations
• Adolescents
• Chapter 8
– Health, Morbidity and Mortality
• Woman’s health and safe motherhood

7. ICPD FoA
• The FoA explicitly refers to:
– Access to safe abortion
– LGBTIQ rights
– Sexual rights
– Rights of women, adolescents and young people, migrants,
displaced people, people with disabilities
• The FoA refers to structural issues such as:
– Population dynamics
– Climate Change
• The FoA does not refer to:
– Global macroeconomic structures
– Trade
– Privatization

8. What is missing in the SDGs?
• Universal access to a comprehensive package of SRH
services
• Women’s sexuality, bodily rights and autonomy
• A life cycle approach to women’s health
• LGBTIQ rights
• Recognition of diverse forms of family

9. Way Forward
• Select a set of indicators, not one, to build a story
If Contraceptive Prevalence Rate is the SDG Indicator
then contrast that with Method Mix, Male Use, Informed
Choice, studies on service provider biases (towards long-
term methods), incentives and disincentives (as per
population control policies), etc.
• Use smaller group studies to show discrepancies in
data and how marginalized groups are differently
affected
National MMR compared to MMR in rural areas, conflict or
post-conflict areas

10. Way Forward
• Identify the rights we want within each target
• Develop and use rights-based indicators
Adolescent Birth Rate
– Access to education. School enrolment and dropout rates of girls
– Early marriage – Religious and cultural influence in encouraging
early marriage, lack of implementation of existing laws and
policies
One such story comes from Bangladesh, where we work - Sumitra’s village
was affected by cyclone Sidr in 2007 and flood Aila in 2009. Her
community is heavily dependent on fishing as both a source of food and
income, which were affected drastically. This led to further impoverishment
of the communities, and families started marrying girls off early - a practice
parents encourage during difficult times as they hope it will safeguard their
daughters’ futures. Sumitra met this fate. She got pregnant soon after her
marriage but was unable to access proper food or medical care because
her village was cut off during one of many the climate disasters. She
suffered malnutrition and a number of reproductive health problems and
consequently miscarried.

11. In Conclusion
So if we are to achieve universal access to sexual and
reproductive health and rights, and achieve it for all people, it is
important that we ensure that our governments don’t limit
themselves to implementing the SDGs and continue to
implement as well as close the gaps in other instruments they
have agreed to.

12. Perera, Sachini (2016, March). SDGs and ICPD: Exploring
Linkages and Strategizing the Way Forward to Achieve
SRHR for ALL. Presentation made at a side event at the 60th
Session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW),14
March 2016, New York, USA, organized by the Asia Pacific
Women’s Watch (APWW).