The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) has urged African countries to increase investment in family planning to benefit girls and women. UNFPA Executive Director Babatunde Osotimehin told Xinhua on Sunday that the largest burden of unmet family planning needs globally was in Africa. ‘‘Many African governments are not investing enough in family planning,” said Osotimeh, who also holds the rank of UN Under-Secretary-General. Osotimehin said family planning was central to the welfare of families and women. He said that in many circumstances African women didn’t have the opportunity to decide on the number of children to have. ‘‘Women face many obstacles depending on the context, including cultural and religious reasons,” he said, adding “we, therefore, have to educate our boys and men on the role they have towards gender equality.” Osotimehin said that for family planning to be successful, there was need for a comprehensive approach including training of health workers. In 2012, UNFPA came up with the FP2020 initiative that aimed to enable 120 million women in the 69 poorest countries globally to access modern contraception. Osotimehin said a majority of the women to benefit from the initiative will be from Africa.
