Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Population Education

Population Education

Some people think that population education is only the study of population related issues. On the other hand, some others consider population education as getting information about a population situation, various issues affecting it and ways of managing the issues. However, in reality an education cannot be limited to getting information and studying issues. Education should deal in a broader manner with the process of bringing changes in human behaviour. Therefore, population education can be defined as a process of developing awareness and understanding of population situation amongst people and making them more responsible towards managing population.

Population education makes the people aware of population related issues. It also brings about changes in their behaviour. By doing so, it makes the people more responsible towards solving population related problems. Thus, there is an improvement in the quality of their lives.

The ultimate aim of population education is to create a happy family life. To do so, it has to influence the overall behaviour of people towards population problems as well as to teach them ways to manage their day-to-day problems.

Thus, the following points can makes us understand the scope of population education:
  1. Understanding Demography.
  2. Affecting Population Change.
  3. Providing Family Life Education
  4. Improving Quality of Life
  5. Teaching Reproductive Health
  6. Helping in Population Management

Importance of Population Education

The rapid growth of population has affected every aspect of daily life. Natural calamities, corruptions, violations of rules and regulations, social disorders and political instability are often the consequences of rapid population growth. People are attracted to urban areas where better facilities and opportunities are available. This has increased population in urban areas, to the levels which are becoming difficult to manage. On the other hand, the population in the rural areas has started falling, resulting in under utilization of available resources. If this situation continues for a long period of time, the nation will have to face a lot of trouble. Population education can play a major role in reversing this trend.

Nepalese society still prefers to stay in large families. Moreover, a male child is still preferred. Thus, couples continue to increase their family size to get more sons and stay in large families. In addition, early marriage still continues to occur in Nepal. All these are increasing population rapidly. This is called Rapid Population Growth (RPG). Population education can help in identifying causes of rapid population growth.

After it has made understand the causes of rapid population growth and its ill-effects, population education helps to find ways of solving these problems. It teaches to bring about changes in attitude and behaviour. With these changes population related problems can be solved. The quality of lives thus improves.


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