found that larger cohorts of children are born in auspicious years, and that they have higher schooling attainment. They conclude that this is because parents are more likely to invest in planned children.

## **_4.3   Are family planning programs likely to work in the poorest countries?_**

The experience of countries such as the Republic of Korea in the 1960s, and others such as Indonesia, Bangladesh or Nepal shows that sustained fertility decline can occur in poor countries, given political commitment to family planning programs. This commitment was driven by poverty and sharply rising population growth rates. For example India’s censuses showed decadal growth of 11-14 percent from the 1920s, but this jumped to 22 percent in 195161, and 25 percent during 1961-71. Similar population growth rates were seen in the Asian region and sub-Saharan Africa (UN 2013). However, sub-Saharan Africa’s small population base in the 1950s meant low increases in numbers, a situation that is changing very quickly (Figure 4).

Political commitment to family planning has sometimes been low in many sub-Saharan African countries, which may have contributed to their slow fertility decline (Cleland et al 2006, 2011; Bongaarts 2006; Machiyama 2010).<sup>11</sup> But this can change quickly, as evidenced by the success of the Rwandan government’s concerted push since the mid-2000s to reduce fertility. Until then, both Rwanda and its neighbor Burundi were poor, densely populated countries with high fertility and weak family planning programs. Then in contrast with Burundi, Rwandan Government officials spoke out about the need to reduce fertility. A country-wide information dissemination program was implemented, along with sharply increased access to contraceptive methods. Between the DHS surveys of 2005 and 2010 the Total Fertility Rate fell from 6.1 to 4.6 children per woman, and the use of modern methods of contraception among married women rose from 10% to 45% (National Institute of Statistics of Rwanda, 2011). Meanwhile total fertility in Burundi was 6.4 in 2010 (Institut de Statistiques et d’Études Économiques du Burundi, 2010).

Many countries in sub-Saharan Africa show some fertility decline, indicating a desire to lower fertility, and family planning programs can build on this and accelerate fertility decline. These programs are likely to be most effective when accompanied by other measures addressing basic government failures that help sustain poverty and high fertility ― including efforts to improve health and schooling, and to expand income-earning opportunities. Family planning programs help by increasing access to contraception, and by providing informational outreach to accelerate perception of the benefits of shifting to a more secure equilibrium in which people have fewer children and are able to invest more in them.

# **5.   Conclusions**

The management of environmental common property resources is complex because these resources are unpriced, so people have to agree to self-impose a price for using them. Their over-exploitation by countries that started industrializing early has led to global warming, the fallout of which will in an ironic twist of fate fall primarily on the developing world, much of which is still poor and has low per capita emissions. These countries will be the first to experience declines in agricultural output, poorer health outcomes, disruption of rainfall patterns, 12