The UN Population Fund (UNFPA), in its new report, revealed that millions of people are denied the freedom to begin families due to high life expenses, conflicts and lack of compatible partners, not because they reject paternity.
UNFPA, in its population report of 2025, “the true fertility crisis: the search for the reproductive agency in a changing world,” indicates that the world does not face a crisis of falling birth rates, but a reproductive agency crisis.
The executive director of the UNFPA, Dr. Natalia Kanem, said that a large number of people cannot create the families who want and link the problem with the lack of choice, do not want, with important consequences for people and societies.
According to Dr. Kanem, “that is the true crisis of fertility, and the answer lies in responding to what people say they need: paid family license, affordable fertility care and support partners.”
The report, which includes a 14,000-surveyed UNFPA-Yogov survey in 14 countries, including Nigeria, found that the alarmingly high proportions of adults cannot carry out their intentions of fertility due to economic and social barriers.
Other countries surveyed include India, Brazil, Morocco, South Africa, Indonesia, Mexico, Italy, Thailand, Hungary, the United States, Sweden, the Republic of Korea and Germany.
The mixture of low, medium and high income countries, and those with low and high fertility rates, was selected to represent “a wide variety of countries with different cultural contexts, fertility rates and policy approaches.”
According to the report, almost 20 percent of reproductive adults believe they will not be able to have the number of children they want, and almost a third have experienced an involuntary pregnancy.
In addition, 39 percent reported that financial limitations had affected or would affect their ability to carry out the size of their desired family, while almost one in five said the fears of the future, such as climate change, environmental degradation, wars and pandemics, would have taken them or led them to have fewer children of the desired ones.
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In addition, almost 25 percent have felt unable to fulfill their desire for a child at its preferred time, but only 12 percent of people cited infertility or difficulty conceiving as the reason for not having the number of children they wanted.
That figure was higher in countries like Thailand (19 percent), United States (16 percent) and South Africa (15 percent).
In particular, young people overwhelmingly report concerns and uncertainty about their future. Many expect to experience worse results than their parents. His concerns about climate change, economic instability and increased global conflicts are reflected in the elections they take on the raising of families.
The report warns against simplistic or coercive responses to birth rates in Declive, such as bonuses for babies or fertility objectives, pointing out that these policies are largely ineffective and can violate human rights.
UNFPA urged governments to empower people to make freely reproductive decisions, even investing in affordable homes, decent work, parental license and the full range of reproductive health services and reliable information. Other solutions include expanding access to paternity for LGBTQI+ and single people.
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