Most developing-country governments have found it difficult to increase family planning budgets because their economies are under pressure and they have many other development needs (43, 267). Meanwhile, donor contributions to family planning programs declined in real purchasing power during the 1980s (56). While donor contributions are rising again, most donor countries face many other demands for development assistance as well as for population assistance (21 ).

Government funding and donor support for family planning programs in developing countries currently amount to about US$4 billion per year (21 , 93 ). If contraceptive prevalence is to rise from the current level of about 50% to 65%, government and donor financial support would need to equal about $6.2 billion annually (33). The draft Program of Action of the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) estimates that satisfying all need for family planning would raise contraceptive prevalence to nearly 70% by 2015. The cost of family planning programs in the developing countries would be about $14 billion (in 1993 US$) (191, 194).

Even a small shift in donor spending priorities could go a long way to assuring funding that would meet the rising demand for family planning and reproductive health services (130, 176 ). The draft Program of Action for the ICPD estimates that external assistance for family planning programs will need to rise to US$6 billion in 2015 (194). At the International Forum on Population in the 21st Century, sponsored by the United Nations in Amsterdam in 1989, the international community agreed that donor support for population programs should rise from just over 1% to become 4% of overall development assistance (30).

Donor population assistance budgets are being pressed to support not only family planning but also other social needs. For the past 30 years, however, the evidence has mounted that effective service delivery is key to client satisfaction and to widespread contraceptive use (196). Thus donors should maintain their focus on supporting delivery of high-quality family planning services. At the same time, family planning programs and other programs that focus on women, the environment, health, and other social development issues should cooperate as much as possible; progress in each area reinforces the others (36, 61, 112, 196, 231).

Governments, both in developing countries and in donor countries, provide family planning for various reasons—as a health measure, as a human right, to improve the situation of women, in response to popular demand, and to lower fertility and slow population growth for economic and environmental reasons. People everywhere want family planning to improve their lives. Substantial public commitment to family planning programs has improved the lives of millions and has aided national development in many countries over the past 30 years. If family planning programs help even more people to meet their own reproductive health needs in coming years, the benefits to society will grow.