A very interesting article by Joseph A. D'Agostino, Vice President for Communications at the Population Research Institute, titled “USAID's 'Population Stabilization' Efforts Work Too Well in Third-World Countries” is published at Human Events, the National Conservative Weekly (20 February 2006).

The article discusses America’s ridiculous involvement in shrinking the population of poor and “suicidal” (with lower or no birth rate) countries.

“Population stabilization” in developing countries is an official purpose of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), though in keeping with the zeitgeist, efforts to achieve that goal are today called family planning programs. In this time of massive deficits, American taxpayers pay over $400 million a year (conservatively estimated) to reduce the populations of Third World nations whose birthrates have already collapsed or are collapsing.

The article pirtucarly pays attention to the fact that America also invests in decreasing Armenia’s population, a small nation of less than 3 million people, where emigration is becoming a national disaster. Mr. D’Agostino writes, “It is not only mighty former enemies to which USAID ships contraception by the boatload. Tiny little Armenia, already the victim of a massive genocide by the Turks in the 20th Century, has a birthrate of 1.4 also, and is also losing people though it has only 3 million to begin with. The UN conservatively projects that the proportion of retirees (people 65 or older) in the population will double to 24% by 2050. Can Armenia afford that? Why are we contributing to this problem?”

This is an interesting issue. I am glad Americans are bringing this up, because, ironically, I was thinking today of a conversation I had four years ago with an Armenian community leader, who was very concerned with America’s involvement to reduce Armenia’s already-small population.