TOP released a 1-hour film interview of Carl Wahren on 24 April that has been praised by eminent experts and demographers. We are now working on two more films about pioneers in the field of family planning. But to finish these films we need a few more donations.

By The Overpopulation Project

The interview of Carl Wahren this winter, covering a period of more than 60 years, revealed many important and fascinating details in the history of family planning. Those of you who have watched it are aware of this, and hopefully help to spread it. Carl, who died in April, described success stories as well as setbacks from which lessons can be drawn. His professional life started in 1962, and he spoke on Swedish Radio and wrote Op-Ed’s in the newspapers up to his death. The film has been watched by hundreds of persons on TOP’s YouTube channel but deserves much more attention, especially from politicians and policymakers.

Statements about the film from demographers:

“Thanks so much for sharing the film. I enjoyed it greatly. I met Carl a few times and admired him greatly.”

John Cleland, Emeritus Professor of Medical Demography at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine

“Many thanks for sending this excellent document. Carl Wahren was among the pioneers of international family planning, those people who changed the world by anticipating the population problem and finding the appropriate solutions. The film nicely summarizes his personal commitment to advancing these programs for the benefit of all women around the world”

Michel Garenne, PhD in Demography,
Senior Fellow, FERDI, Université de Clermont-Auvergne, France
Extraordinary Professor, University of the Western Cape, South Africa

“Carl was a pioneer in the family planning movement who cared deeply about improving the lives of women in poor countries. This film provides an interesting and valuable summary of the early years of this movement in which he was a leader.”

John Bongaarts, Distinguished scholar, Population Council, Washington DC, USA

“It’s great to learn about the experience of Carl Wahren- a family planning pioneer in developing countries. I truly enjoyed this valuable film, which will be regarded as a learning document on family planning practices for the present and the next generation of learners. His contributions will be recognized in the field of population and development in developing countries by enhancing the quality of lives of people- especially women”.

Mohammad Mainul Islam, Professor and former Chairman of the Department of Population Sciences at the University of Dhaka, Bangladesh

New films from TOP – and call for donations

Given the contemporary trend to write family planning success stories out of history, we feel it is vital to put on the record the first-hand accounts of those who were involved. These people are now becoming elderly so time is of the essence. It was a great privilege to fulfill Carl Wahren’s wish to be recorded before his death. We are currently working toward publishing edited interviews with Malcolm Potts and Bill Ryerson. We are hoping to add more family planning elders to the project over time.

Malcolm Potts is Emeritus Professor at the School of Public Health, University of California at Berkeley, and also a founding director of the Bixby Center for Population, Health, and Sustainability. His experience of work on population, health and contraception goes almost as far back as that of Carl, to the mid 1960’s. He has not only been a productive scientist (with 10 books and 350 scientific papers and articles) but has also been a consultant and mentor for family planning programs in several countries. Extensive interview footage with Professor Potts has already been recorded by Sofia Pineda Ochoa, producer of the film Endgame 2050. With Sofia’s generous collaboration, this will form the foundation of our film.

A third film interviews Bill Ryerson, who discusses his career and work experiences in family planning, including his impressive work developing the Population Media Center. This organization uses radio, TV and social media communication, including serial ‘soap operas’, to influence the norms and actions of listeners and viewers. Their work has increased the use of contraception in several countries.

The Carl Wahren film is a good quality, low-budget film, costing only about 1900 US dollars. Other available films on overpopulation and family planning cost a lot more; for example, the excellent 8 Billion Angels cost about 1 million US dollars. With donations of about 3000 US dollars, it should be possible to finalize the Potts and Ryerson films. Much editing of the film material is needed, and complementary footage needs to be added. The photographer Johan Heurgren did a great job filming Carl and editing that film, and he will also help us in future work if we obtain more funding. 

This work is vital and urgent. It is now thirty years since the landmark United Nations Conference on Population and Development in Cairo. Thirty years since the international community supported national family planning programs that championed the vast benefits to parents and children of birth control, child spacing and smaller families. Family planning programs, once widely supported as effective enablers of development, are largely forgotten by the general public. Even worse, they are now often disparaged by the UNFPA, the organization tasked with facilitating global efforts to end population growth. Since the 1994 Cairo conference, the UNFPA has rebranded itself as “the United Nations sexual and reproductive health agency.” The UNFPA now claims any focus on population numbers is ‘alarmist’ and past efforts for population control have been ‘futile and harmful,’ despite most of them being entirely voluntary and vastly beneficial for women and society at large. Within this narrative, pioneering family planning programs which improved the lives of millions of women are described as nefarious plots to harm and control them.

The young generation, policymakers and the general public in many countries need to be informed about overpopulation, population policies and the true history of family planning programs. These first-hand accounts will add to the reviews of several national family planning programs already published by TOP, as well as recent research that also confirms their value and importance.

Please contact Frank Götmark, frank.gotmark@bioenv.gu.se, if you want to donate to further this important work. We appreciate your support!