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Expert Group Meeting on "Demographic Changes and Family Wellbeing in Africa"

Date: Mon, Jan 23 - Wed, Jan 25 2023 | Expert Group Meetings
Location: Pretoria, South Africa
Time: All day
Expert Group Meeting on "Demographic Changes and Family Wellbeing in Africa"

The Department of Sociology in  the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Pretoria in cooperation with the Focal Point on the Family, Division for Inclusive Social Development (DISD) of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA), Doha International Family Institute (DIFI) and the International Federation for Family Development (IFFD) is organizing an Expert Group Meeting on “Demographic Changes and Family Wellbeing in Africa” to be held 23-25 January 2023 at the University of Pretoria in Pretoria, South Africa.

The meeting is organized as part of the preparations for the thirtieth anniversary of the International Year of the Family, 2024 (IYF+30) and will build on the findings of the Expert Group Meeting held in 2020 which recommended focusing on several megatrends to guide the preparations. Those recommendations were reflected in the Reports of the Secretary-General (2020-2021). In 2021, the United Nations General Assembly resolution on the Preparations for the IYF+30 endorsed those recommendations and advised focusing on the trends of new technologies, migration, urbanization as well as demographic trends and climate change as part of the preparations for IYF+30. It is in accordance with this resolution and relevant United Nations mandates, that the Expert Group Meeting is to address demographic trends and their impact on families in Africa.  

To mark the tenth anniversary of the International Year of the Family (IYF) in 1994, the African Union Commission adopted the Plan of Action on the Family in Africa which advocates for the “promotion, formulation, implementation and monitoring of policies to ensure the protection of and support to the African family so as to enable it to play its vital role more effectively in the development of Africa.” 

At the time the  Plan of Action on the Family in Africa was adopted, key challenges affecting the family in the region included high levels of poverty, inadequate social protection mechanisms, low levels of educational attainment, high levels of unemployment, gender inequality, rural to urban migration, displacement, family disintegration, poor sexual and reproductive health indicators and high levels of communicable diseases such as HIV and AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis.   In the three decades since the adoption of the Plan of Action, however, there have been significant socio-economic and demographic transformations that have direct and indirect implications for the well-being of families and their members in the region. It is for this reason that a focus on the family continues to be underscored in other regional instruments such as the African Union Social Policy Framework for Africa (2009) and the African Union Agenda 2063 (2013).  

The planned Expert Group Meeting provides an opportunity to share good practices on policies and programmes that have improved family well-being, take stock of remaining and new family challenges, and recommend a way forward for the post-2024 period.

Concept note
Agenda
Report of the meeting

 

Papers and Presentations