Cairo + Five: Reviewing Progress for Women Five Years After the International Conference on Population and Development

In 1999, five years after the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD), 170 countries and 200 NGOs met to examine the successes and failures of implementing the ICPD's Programme of Action (POA). This article briefly reviews the findings of this meeting. The author explains what the POA is and highlights five of its commitments to improve women's sexual and reproductive health. In spite of these commitments, the POA is found to have shortcomings such as the "sovereignty clause" which provides that "the implementation of the recommendations contained in the Programme of Action is the sovereign right of each country". The author describes four new commitments undertaken by governments at the ICPD Plus Five Review and discusses steps that must be taken to ensure the achievement of both of these goals and the goals in the original POA. [Descriptors: Reproductive Rights - Overview, International]