Mentor’s Comment:  The World Population Day 2025 has reignited global and national discussions on youth empowerment, reproductive rights, and falling fertility rates. With the theme “Empowering young people to create the families they want in a fair and hopeful world”, the UN highlights the need for informed reproductive choices and access to health, education, and economic opportunities, especially for India’s large youth population. The day also coincides with the release of the UNFPA’s State of World Population Report 2025, which warns that the real fertility crisis lies not in declining birth rates, but in the unmet reproductive goals due to financial, social, and infrastructural constraints. 

Today’s editorial analyses the youth empowerment, reproductive rights, and falling fertility rates. This topic is important for  GS Paper I (Indian Society) in the UPSC mains exam.

_

Let’s learn!

Why in the News?

Recently, World Population Day 2025 has brought renewed attention to global and national debates on empowering youth, ensuring reproductive rights, and addressing the challenges of declining fertility rates.

Why is youth empowerment essential for harnessing India’s demographic dividend?

• India’s youth population is a major economic asset: With over 371 million people aged 15–29, India has the world’s largest youth population. If equipped with quality education, skills, health, and family planning services, this segment can become a powerful engine of economic growth and innovation.
• Youth empowerment boosts national productivity and employment: Empowered youth can significantly reduce unemployment and enhance social outcomes. According to the World Bank and NITI Aayog, unlocking youth potential could increase India’s GDP by up to $1 trillion by 2030.
• Empowerment ensures participation in nation-building: By promoting reproductive autonomy, gender equality, and economic independence, youth, especially young women, can participate in decision-making and shape their futures, contributing meaningfully to sustainable development.

What barriers hinder reproductive autonomy and fertility choices in India?

• Limited access to family planning services and information: A significant share of the population lacks access to modern contraceptives, comprehensive sexual and reproductive health education, and counselling. Eg: According to the UNFPA State of World Population Report 2025, 36% of Indian adults faced unintended pregnancies, while 30% had unmet reproductive goals, reflecting systemic gaps in reproductive healthcare access.
• Socio-cultural norms and gender inequality: Patriarchal attitudes, early marriages, and taboos around women’s reproductive rights often prevent young women from making independent fertility decisions. Eg: Though child marriage rates have declined, they remain high at 23.3% (NFHS-5, 2019–21), indicating how cultural practices continue to limit women’s reproductive autonomy.
• Economic insecurity and structural barriers: Financial constraints, lack of housing, quality childcare, and secure employment inhibit couples from achieving their desired family size. Eg: A UNFPA survey found that 38% of Indian respondents cited financial limitations and 22% housing constraintsas major reasons for not fulfilling fertility aspirations.

How have schemes tackled child marriage and women’s empowerment?

• Promoting girls’ education to delay early marriages: Schemes like Project Udaan in Rajasthan focused on keeping girls in secondary school using government scholarships, reducing the incidence of child marriage and teenage pregnancy.
• Enhancing reproductive health awareness and services: Programmes such as Udaan and Advika improved access to modern contraceptives and sexual and reproductive health education, thereby strengthening reproductive agency among young women.
• Empowering adolescents through life skills and leadership training: The Advika programme in Odisha helped prevent child marriage by providing life-skills training, leadership development, and child protection awareness across thousands of villages.
• Fostering economic independence and employment: Project Manzil, implemented in Rajasthan, aligned skill training with young women’s aspirations and connected them to gender-sensitive workplaces, empowering over 16,000 women with employment and negotiation power.
• Engaging communities to shift social norms: Behaviour change strategies under projects like Manzil worked to challenge harmful gender norms and involved families and communities, leading to reduced resistance against girls’ education and work.

Why should population discourse focus on rights and gender equity over fertility panic?

• Respecting reproductive autonomy prevents coercion: Framing falling fertility as a “crisis” can lead to target-driven pronatalist policies that pressure women to reproduce, threatening their right to bodily autonomy. Eg: In countries like Hungary and Iran, such policies have led to restrictions on abortion and contraception, undermining women’s freedom.
• Empowering women yields long-term social gains: Promoting gender equality, economic participation, and education for women improves both fertility decisions and broader development outcomes. Eg: Nordic countries like Sweden focus on workplace equality and parental leave, ensuring women can choose when and whether to have children.
• Inclusive policy design avoids harmful stereotyping: Fertility panic often ignores the needs of those who want children but face barriers, while blaming those who are voluntarily childfree. Eg: The UNFPA’s 2025 report shows that 40% of respondents globally had to forgo childbearing due to financial and structural obstacles, not personal choice.

What can India learn from global responses to fertility decline?

• Focus on enabling choices, not coercion: Countries like South Korea have spent billions on pronatalist incentives, but results remained limited until recent societal support systems (e.g., childcare, housing, and financial aid) improved. India must prioritize voluntary reproductive agency over target-driven incentives.
• Promote gender equity in workforce and caregiving: Fertility policies that reinforce traditional gender roles have backfired. Instead of pressuring women to bear more children, countries like Sweden have boosted fertility by promoting gender-equal parenting, paternal leave, and women’s employment, which India can emulate.

Way forward: 

• Invest in rights-based reproductive health systems: Ensure universal access to quality contraceptives, safe abortion, maternal care, and infertility services, while safeguarding individuals’ reproductive autonomy through accurate health education and gender-sensitive policies.
• Shift from fertility targets to gender equity: Focus on empowering women through education, economic independence, and childcare support, instead of promoting pronatalist incentives that risk reinforcing patriarchal norms and limiting personal choices.

Get an IAS/IPS ranker as your 1: 1 personal mentor for UPSC 2024

Attend Now