Foreign Affairs Committee on March 8th, 2016

[Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin]

We don't. There is not even one occasion where that has occurred.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

You're telling me that never in the history of the UN Population Fund has there ever been support for coercive family planning.

[Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin]

No.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Maybe I'll come at this in a different way. What is your view of the history of China's one-child policy? Would you regard that as coercive family planning?

[Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin]

China's one-child policy is the national policy of China. We were not part of that policy. That's their policy.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Am I incorrect in my belief that the UN Population Fund provided significant funding and support to the one-child policy? It was $50 million in 1979.

[Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin]

No. We never provided.... The UN Population Fund worked in districts in China to try to persuade China to relax the one-child policy so that they could allow women to make choices in family planning.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Sir, according to the Netherlands Interdisciplinary Demographic Institute and a study they published in 2000, the UN Population Fund provided a $50-million grant to China in 1979 that was used at the outset of the program to establish the information gathering system.

According to a report prepared by that research institute, the China Population Information and Research Center was established in 1980 with assistance from UNFPA. Is that information incorrect?

[Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin]

You are talking of gathering information. That's very different from a policy that actually coerced people. That's a different thing.

We work in China. We have to work in China. China has the largest population in the world, so we are there, but we are not part of the one-child policy.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Is it true that in 1983, the UN Population Fund gave an award of over $12,000 to China's family planning chief? Is that correct or not?

[Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin]

China's family planning—

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

To the person in charge of family planning in China.... Has the UN Population Fund ever recognized or awarded China with respect to its one-child policy?

[Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin]

No, not that I know of.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Not that you know of.

In 1989, a UN Population Fund official in Beijing told a Chinese news agency that U.S. charges of coercion within the Chinese program were “groundless”.

Do you think that official was correct to say that charges of coercion within the program were groundless?

[Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin]

In areas that we worked we had no coercion.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Could you maybe identify the areas within China where coercion didn't occur as part of the one-child policy? My understanding of the program is that it was quite consistent across the country at least initially in its application.

[Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin]

When countries decide to put national programs in place, it is not our place. We can advise them. They decide to do what they have to do.

There are many countries where we have been able to change policies. As you've seen, China itself has decided to change its policy. This is part of the advocacy that we have put in place.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

It seems to me, sir, respectfully, that if after awarding the program and giving a substantial amount of seed money in the early years—

[Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin]

We did not give seed money to the one-child policy program.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

You gave it to the information gathering program in the context of—

[Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin]

Yes. The information gathering program is a different thing. If you don't have information, how do you then take positions?

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Respectfully, sir, your association was involved in the setting up of the information—

[Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin]

No, we are not an association—

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Pardon me. Your organization—

[Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin]

We are an intergovernmental organization funded by the United Nations.