India announces doubling its contribution to PPD programme

New Delhi, Oct 28 (ANI): India has announced doubling of its contribution to Partners in Population Development (PPD) programme, as five countries namely Sri Lanka, Nepal, Brazil, Philippines and Tanzania evinced its interest to join the movement.

Union Minister of Health and Family Welfare Ghulam Nabi Azad in his opening remarks announced enhanced annual contribution of India from the current level of 40,000 dollars to 80,000 dollars and urged the participating countries to increase their contributions to strengthen the alliance.

During the three-day Annual Executive Committee and Board meeting of Partners in Population Development (PPD) held at Yogyakarta, Indonesia from October 26 to 28, he also announced ten scholarships for the PG Diploma Course in Public Health Management for one more year at the National Institute of Health and Family welfare, Delhi.

India had offered these scholarships last year for which nine students from the participating countries enrolled for the course.

India is the Chairman of PPD under the Union Minister of Health and Family Welfare Ghulam Nabi Azad, while China is the Co Chair of the organisation.

During the three-day meetings, intense deliberations were held to strengthen the PPD movement. A two-day international conference on "Promoting Family Planning and Maternal Health for Poverty alleviation" was organised by PPD on this occasion.

During the Annual Board meeting, five countries namely Sri Lanka, Nepal, Brazil, Philippines and Tanzania participated as observers who wanted to join the movement. Mexico expressed its interest to revive its membership.

The Partners in Population Development (PPD) is an inter governmental alliance of 24 countries. This alliance provides the mechanism to promote partnership and cooperation between the member countries, to achieve the objectives of the International Conference on Population Development (ICPD) and also the MDGs.

PPD has a permanent observer status at the UN General Assembly. PPD was launched during ICPD meeting in Cairo in 1994. The alliance include countries such as India, China, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Egypt, South Africa and Kenya.

The PPD member countries represent more than 57 percent of global population. (ANI)