In 2025, the global fertility rate is making headlines. In many countries, birth rates are declining, leading policymakers to sound the alarm over the potential for “population collapse”. In an attempt to mitigate the demographic changes, they face, some governments are employing drastic measures to persuade women to have more children. Despite this fact, millions of people around the world are unable to have the number of children they want. In every country, regardless of total fertility rate, the most consequential reproductive decision a human being can make – when, whether and with whom to have a child – is being undermined. UNFPA’s new State of World Population report argues that the real crisis we are facing is not a problem of demographic change: It is a crisis of reproductive agency.

The State of World Population report 2023 will discuss the milestone of 8 billion recently reached by the human population and the narratives surrounding population change. We will look in particular at discourses which put forward ideas of 'too many' or 'too few' people and at the harm this can cause women and girls whose reproductive choices are on the line.

The report will look into the social, institutional, economic and legal forces that determine how much power a woman has over her body and to make her own choices, the extent to which she has access to quality, non-discriminatory information and services, and how gender inequality underpins all of these. The report will also analyze retrospective data to measure bodily autonomy for girls and draw on case studies on bodily autonomy among marginalized groups: LGBTIQ+, indigenous and disability communities. The report also reveals how serious many of the shortfalls in bodily autonomy are; many have worsened under the pressures of the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic. Right now, for instance, record numbers of women and girls are at risk of gender-based violence and harmful practices such as early marriage.

The report describes the struggle for rights and choices over the past 50 years and shows how UNFPA played a critical role in helping women and adolescents overcome the diverse and evolving obstacles to their accessing information and services, having the same rights and opportunities as men and boys, making their own decisions in life, and realizing their full potential. The report is structured around major threats or challenges to rights and choices over the years, and analyzes their impact on the lives of women and adolescents.