What and When Is World Population Day?
World Population Day is recognized globally as a day to appreciate and recognize the importance of population-related issues. Matters that are key to determining the state of any population include population growth and population decrease with respective rates involved. Each year several governments, civil societies, and nongovernmental organizations come together to celebrate this day. These partners then commemorate the day with a theme that directly addresses population status. The theme then helps indirectly to control more essential aspects of life such as availability of resources, the standards of living, and state of the economy amongst other aspects. Awareness is created by providing access of relevant information and other resources to the general population to help them better understand their relationship to their environment as well as promoting development. The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) recommends a country-led and country-focused approach to sensitization on population issues.
When is World Population Day?
This significant day is observed each year on the 11th of July. World Population Day gained significance on 11th July 1987, when the United Nations Population Fund set the day aside to recognize the day when the world’s population became an approximate five billion people. The person chosen to act as the symbol of the five billionth person alive on earth was Matej Gaspar from Zagreb in Croatia. Zagreb was chosen because it was the current host of the 1987 Summer Universiade. Following this milestone, the Governing Council of the UNFPA recommended that World Population Day be observed annually. The United Nations General Assembly headed to this request in December 1990 by signing the 45/216 resolution. This resolution officially allowed 11th July to be set aside as a day to create awareness on population issues each year. On July 11, 1990 more than 90 countries marked the holiday and it has been celebrated on the same day ever since.
