The National Population Council agreed to begin launching the urgent plan for the National Population and Development Strategy starting January 1, 2025, focusing on the first three years of the plan, and targeting a total fertility rate of 2.1 per woman by 2030.
This came during Madbouly’s presidency, today, Thursday, of the meeting of the National Population Council, in the presence of Dr. Khaled Abdel Ghaffar, Deputy Prime Minister for Human Development, Minister of Health and Population, and Lieutenant General Engineer Kamel Al-Wazir, Deputy Prime Minister for Development. Industrial, Minister of Industry and Transport.
Madbouly stressed the great interest that the Egyptian state pays to the population file, in an effort to achieve the goals of the National Population Strategy, as one of the axes of work to enhance human development plans and push the rates of Economic growth, noting the importance of the role of the National Population Council in this regard, to ensure effective coordination between the various concerned parties to achieve these goals.
At the beginning of the meeting, the Deputy Prime Minister for Development presented a presentation Humanity, Minister of Health And the population, the most prominent measures taken to implement the recommendations issued by previous meetings of the National Population Council, with regard to several axes, most notably strengthening services in the primary health care sector and developing the Egyptian family, addressing the phenomenon of dropping out of education, advancing women’s economic empowerment efforts, and many other axes. That connection.
Counselor Muhammad Al-Homsani, the official spokesman for the Presidency of the Council of Ministers, stated that the meeting witnessed a review of the most prominent features of the urgent executive plan for the National Population and Development Strategy. 2023-2030, which aims to reach a total fertility rate of 2.1 per woman by the year 3030, ensuring a greater framework for governance of the population file, ensuring the necessary rights for women and children, and enhancing development efforts.
It was noted that this urgent plan includes action axes, foremost among which is improving the population characteristics in the targeted centers, such as reducing unemployment, reducing illiteracy, reducing dropout from education, and others, and developing and raising The efficiency of primary health care centers, and building partnerships with various sectors to enhance the effectiveness of family planning and health care services.
The demographic indicators report at the level of the governorates of the Republic for the year 2023 was reviewed, which It represents an important document for the decision maker to achieve the goals of the National Population Strategy, as the report includes general indicators, and detailed indicators for each governorate separately, including the current population, gender, urban and rural ratios, and the inhabited area of Egyptian land, Birth and death rates, as well as marriage and divorce rates, in addition to other indicators, including the density rate in classrooms, the teacher’s share of students, dropout rates, the development of illiteracy rates, unemployment rates, and others.
 
The official spokesman added that the meeting witnessed a review of positive indicators, including an increase in women’s contribution to the labor market to reach 15.9% in 2023 compared to 14.9% in 2021, as evidence of the success of policies that support women’s work and their economic empowerment, in addition to a decrease in the illiteracy rate to 16.1% in 2023 compared to 17.5% in 2021.
Al-Homsani pointed out In its meeting today, the National Population Council also reviewed the executive position of the National Project for Egyptian Family Development until the end of September 2024, as the executive plan includes The project launched by President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, in February 2022, has several axes, namely: the legislative axis, the cultural, awareness-raising and educational axis, the service axis, and the empowering axis.
With regard to On the legislative axis, a number of laws that were issued were reviewed, including Law No. 186 of 2023 amending some provisions of the Children’s Law promulgated by Law No. 12 of the year 1996, which includes increasing the penalty for not registering births, and granting the sponsoring mother a four-month paid care leave if she sponsors a child less than six months old, as well as Law No. 185 of 2023 amending some provisions of the Penal Code promulgated by Law No. 58 of 1937 and tightening penalties for harassment. Violence and bullying, in addition to Law No. 28 of 2023 amending some provisions of Law No. 26 of 1975 regarding nationality. The Egyptian government grants Egyptian nationality to minor children to foreign mothers, whether they have acquired Egyptian nationality or were born in Egypt and belong to a country whose language is Arabic or whose religion is Islam, in order to achieve the principle of equality between men and women alike in granting Egyptian nationality to their children.
With regard to the cultural, awareness and educational axis, a number of activities that were implemented in this context were reviewed, as the Ministry of Social Solidarity trained 4,500 pioneers. A rural woman is among the 15,000 targeted pioneers, and the pioneers have implemented more than 14 million visits annually from a target of 15 million, for a total of 1.5 million beneficiaries, as was done through the “Mawaddah” program. Educating more than a million young men and women about to get married and newly married couples, and they also benefited from the “Mawaddah” platform. There are about 5 million people digitally, with about 10,000 beneficiaries benefiting from the “Ask Mawaddah” service. For digital consultations.
In connection with this axis, the role of the National Council for Women was reviewed, which included implementing 58 medical convoys targeting more than 17 thousand citizens, and organizing 700 cultural events for more than 365 people. One thousand beneficiaries, with the implementation of 40 campaigns at the level of 20 governorates in cooperation with the “Reunification” Unit. At Al-Azhar Al-Sharif, about 247 thousand women benefited from it, and educational seminars were held in addition to training 900 community leaders to help the council spread the campaign in their community.
With regard to the service axis, the Ministry of Health And the population by providing family planning and reproductive health services in the most remote and needy areas, with a total of 4.4 million beneficiaries, and in university and private hospitals, with a total of 24 hospitals, and in civil society organizations. And government hospitals, with a total of 23 million women beneficiaries, in addition to making about 29 thousand visits to mobile clinics and deploying 2,354 awareness and service convoys and reproductive health convoys, with about 58 thousand visits organized by the visiting doctor system and contracting with doctors to fill the gaps in the provision of family planning services, in addition to implementing workshops. Work and training for more than 25,000 doctors in the areas of providing family planning services, and training for more than 12,000 nurses in several training courses to provide planning services. Family, postpartum or abortion services, as well as more than 12,000 pioneers, intellectuals, media officials, pharmacists, and statistics officials in the governorates.
In connection with this axis, the Ministry of Social Solidarity purchased equipment. For 65 clinics, and the goal is to establish 102 family planning clinics in NGOs, for a total of 550,000 women who attend, and a total of 420,000 women who use the means, and to equip and equip 37 clinics. Eligibility for family planning and reproductive health services.
With regard to the empowerment axis, the executive position of the family development units in the various governorates was discussed, and it was noted that the construction work for 20 An integrated hospital, redesigning it to serve as family development units, handing over 11 production units to the National Council for Women to operate, as well as handing over 11 nurseries to the Ministry of Social Solidarity to operate, in addition to the trial operation of the part 10 medical units.
At the conclusion of the meeting, the Prime Minister assigned the Ministry of Planning and International Cooperation to coordinate with international institutions to provide grants and aid programs that support the steps to implement the national project for the development of the Egyptian family. The Ministry of Industry is to enhance employment opportunities for women in the industrial sector within the framework of their economic empowerment. He also assigned the Ministry of Social Solidarity to continue efforts to empower women economically. He also assigned the Ministry of Health and Population to develop an urgent plan to provide the human needs for the work of reproductive health centers. He also assigned the Ministry Justice Department will follow up on the position of the necessary legislation in this regard, especially with regard to educational dropouts and child labor.
Dr. Mostafa Madbouly also directed to focus on the media dimension in educating citizens about population issues By highlighting these issues in dramatic works and during citizens’ movement on new means of transportation, pointing in this regard to the importance of religious discourse in achieving this goal through the role of institutions.
The meeting was attended by Dr. Rania Al-Mashat, Minister of Planning, Economic Development and International Cooperation, Dr. Ayman Ashour, Minister of Higher Education and Scientific Research, and Dr. Manal Awad, Minister Local Development, Dr. Maya Morsi, Minister of Social Solidarity, Counselor Adnan Fanjari, Minister of Justice, Dr. Osama Al-Azhari, Minister of Endowments, and Eng. Sherif El-Sherbiny, Minister of Housing, Utilities and Communities. Al-Omraniyah, Mohamed Gibran, Minister of Labour, Dr. Ahmed Fouad Hanno, Minister of Culture, Mohamed Abdel Latif, Minister of Education and Technical Education, Major General Khairat Barakat, Head of the Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics, Dr. Abla Alfi, Deputy Minister of Health and Population for Population Affairs, and Ambassador Nabil. Habashi, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Immigration, and Affairs of Egyptians Abroad, Major General Manar Mukhtar, Director of the General Administration of Community Communication at the Ministry of Interior, and Dr. Khaled Fathallah, President of the Broadcasting Institute. and Television, Supervisor of the Information Center at the National Media Authority, Dr. Eid Abdel Wahed, Head of the Executive Body of the General Authority for Literacy and Adult Education, Dr. Amira Tawadros, Director of the Demographic Center at the Ministry of Planning, Economic Development and International Cooperation, responsible for the National Population Development Project, and Dr. Ahmed Al-Sharqawi, Undersecretary of the Al-Azhar Institutes Sector at Al-Azhar Al-Sharif, Reverend Antonius Sobhi, Program Development Consultant at the Diocese of Public Services, and officials of relevant ministries and authorities.
