Partners in Creating the Future
The "Higher Population Council" Lectures at the National Defense College
The "Higher Population Council" Lectures at the National Defense College
Tuesday, 5 November 2019

Rania Al-Abbadi, assistant secretary-general of the Higher Population Council, delivered a lecture at the Royal Jordanian National Defense College on Tuesday regarding “The Population Policy in Jordan and its Relationship with National Security."

During the lecture, which was addressed to the students of the National Defense Course 17/2020, Al- Abbadi pointed out that all development sectors in the society have population dimensions. She stressed that planners in each sector should carefully analyze population aspects and approach sectoral plans based on the relevant population issues. Al-Abbadi indicated that integrating population issues in development plans requires systematically identifying and addressing population-related factors and strategies.

Al-Abbadi highlighted that population dynamics and the associated demographic factors affect all aspects of human life, including the environment, noting that achieving the balance between population growth and economic growth, social harmony and ideological security, maintaining the stability and security of the Jordanian citizen and achieving economic, political and administrative development are priorities of national security.

Al-Abbadi explained that the most important factors that contribute to achieving the expected population opportunity in Jordan are the promotion of education and economic reform and the development of society, including social security, organizing internal immigrations, and the increment of savings, in addition to establishing the principles of good governance, and strengthening reproductive health/ family planning services. She also stressed the need to achieve equality between males and females in the various field of society. She noted that in terms of the work force, the rate of working females is only about 15% of the 2.4 million women in the working age(15 and older); nearly 2 million of these women are economically inactive and about 97,000 are in the process of looking for work.

She also pointed out that the main challenges facing population and development issues in the society are the high rate of the youthful population that exceeds the rates of economic growth, in addition to the decline in the access to employment opportunities in the future due to the impact of immigrations, the poor distribution balance of development gains to governorates, the weak partnership between the public and private sectors, and the difficulty in providing subnational data and indicators.

Al-Abbadi expressed the need to move from the level of humanitarian aid to the level of development and investment assistance required to enable communities to host refugees and provide them with the services they require. She also stressed taking the population dimension into account when drafting plans in all institutions, in addition to considering the implications of local, regional and international changes on the population and its elements.

At the end of the lecture, an extensive discussion was held during which Al-Abbadi answered the various queries raised by the attendees.