World Population Day to focus on ICPD themes

The eighth annual World Population Day will be celebrated world-wide on 11 July 1994. Last year, activities marking the occasion took place in more than 110 countries. According to Dr. Nafis Sadik, Executive Director of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and Secretary-General of ICPD, this year's celebration will help draw attention to the upcoming Cairo Conference and to its themes of "choices and responsibilities"--the basic right and responsibility of couples and individuals to make informed choices about child-bearing, and the responsibility of societies to help them in achieving their reproductive goals. To promote World Population Day, UNFPA's Information and External Relations Division has produced a colorful poster, a 15-minute video (available in English, French and Spanish) emphasizing maternal health, and a special pamphlet and a new edition of the Population Issues Briefing Kit (both in English, French, Spanish and Arabic). The kit outlines the major issues to be addressed at ICPD. UNFPA is also sponsoring a 5-15 July exhibit at UN headquarters, featuring photos and text from Material World: A Global Family Portrait, a book to be published in October. The book, by Peter Menzel, will document an extraordinary project in which 16 prominent photographers travelled to 30 countries to photograph typical families surrounded by all their possessions--in some cases a few jars and jugs, in others an abundance of electronic gadgetry.