In line with this, a five-day workshop on Reproductive Health Strategy is being held from April 19 to 23 at Palasia Hotel, sponsored by United Nations Fund for Population Activity.
“Basically this workshop is to assist Palau in developing a comprehensive reproductive health strategic plan,” said Watson.
Watson said that in the workshop they are tackling reproductive health issues in the country that they need to start addressing.
“It’s not that we don’t have programs, the services are there, but this should give us some sort of direction,” Watson said.
Watson added that as a nation, they need to know if the reasons for having low fertility rate are natural or caused by other factors. “And when that is identified, we can focus on what to do and how we can integrate these things to address the issue,” she said. “We have a lot of reproductive health programs. But this workshop will help us to understand why this is happening.”
The issue on reproductive health is a different and comprehensive problem, according to Watson. For example, she said, if the reason why the population is not growing is because of obesity or because of sexually transmitted diseases or other factors, in understanding these issues, Palau will be able to address the population problem and use the resources that the country has.
“There are a lot of more effective ways of helping the population grow, and we’re in that process right now,” said Watson.
UNICEF Technical Experts Wame Baravilala and Peter Zinck are the key speakers in the workshop to help Palau draft its Reproductive Health Action Plan.
Minister of Health Dr. Stevenson Kuartei and Senator Kathy Kesolei, some public health officials, people from the community and students from Palau High School participated in the workshop.
