United Nations Population Fund

The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) is the United Nations agency concerned with sexual and reproductive health and reproductive rights. Its mandate is to help ensure that every pregnancy is wanted, every childbirth is safe and every young person's potential is fulfilled, while supporting countries in addressing population and development issues.

Core mandate and priorities

UNFPA helps countries expand access to sexual and reproductive health services, particularly for people who face poverty, discrimination or exclusion. Its work links individual health and rights with wider development goals.

• It supports voluntary family planning, including access to contraceptives, information and counselling, so that individuals can make informed reproductive choices.
• It supports maternal health services, including skilled maternity care and emergency obstetric care, to reduce preventable maternal deaths.
• Its three transformative results are ending the unmet need for family planning, ending preventable maternal deaths, and ending gender-based violence and harmful practices.

Rights, women and adolescent girls

The International Conference on Population and Development, 1994, placed individual dignity, reproductive health and rights at the centre of population policy. This approach guides UNFPA's work: population policy should expand people's choices rather than impose demographic targets.

• UNFPA promotes reproductive rights, including the right to decide freely and responsibly the number, spacing and timing of children, without discrimination, coercion or violence.
• It works to prevent and respond to gender-based violence and harmful practices such as child marriage and female genital mutilation.
• It supports adolescents and young people through age-appropriate sexuality education, reproductive health information and services, and opportunities to participate in decisions affecting their lives.

Population evidence and humanitarian support

UNFPA combines service-related support with population data and analysis, helping governments understand who needs assistance and where gaps exist.

• It supports censuses, demographic analysis and the use of population evidence in development planning, including attention to age structure and population ageing.
• During humanitarian emergencies, it supports continuity of reproductive and maternal health services and measures to prevent and respond to gender-based violence.
• It works with governments and partners through technical assistance, capacity-building, advocacy and programme support.