The primary objective of the Ireland Aid programme is to assist developing countries in their efforts to achieve sustainable development. The links between demographic factors and sustainable development are accepted by all developed and developing countries, particularly in the aftermath of the 1994 Cairo International Conference on Population and Development – ICPD – and its review in 1999. The principles and programme of action adopted by the international community at the ICPD recognised the basic right of all couples and individuals to decide freely and responsibly on the spacing of their children and to have all the information, education and means to do so. The ICPD principles and programme of action explicitly reject the use of any form of coercion in reproductive health programmes.
It is estimated that some half a million women in the developing world die each year due to pregnancy-related causes and that 350 million women have no access to any form of contraception. The United Nations Population Fund – UNFPA – extends assistance to developing countries at their request to help them address reproductive health and population issues. UNFPA is committed by its mandates to the principles of voluntarism and all of its programmes of assistance throughout the world are based on the principles of freedom of choice and informed consent. Its guiding policy, as laid down by its Governing Council in 1985, stipulates that UNFPA is "not to provide assistance for abortions, abortion services and abortion-related equipment and supplies as a method of family planning".