Tuesday, July 11, 10am to noon, Conrad Hotel, Wireless Road, Bangkok

Do join us on World Population Day, the most important day in UNFPA’s calendar, whose theme this year is Family Planning: Empowering People, Developing Nations.

Our special programme this year will honour the rich legacy of the legendary Mechai Viravaidya, popularly known as “Thailand’s Condom King”, a key architect of his country’s successful family planning programme as well as its lifesaving public health campaign to address the HIV/AIDS epidemic.

Khun Mechai will deliver the Keynote Address, outlining his life’s work, its impact, and his vision for Thailand’s future at a time of rapidly shifting demographics and changing family structures.  This is a very special talk, not to be missed.

We will also feature a special regional panel of policy experts and civil society advocates to candidly discuss the challenges in ensuring access to sexual and reproductive health services, including family planning, from a human rights and gender equality perspective across Asia and the Pacific – at a time when gains made in recent years are under threat in many contexts. 

Our panelists

Ms. Tharita Sathan, a university female student orginated from Thailand's Northeast: Sharing her initative in establishing a project to provide sex education in all the schools of her sub-district with funding from the Ministry of Public Health. The project was so successful that the Ministry requested to extend the project year-by-year over the past 5 or 6 years. She also received several national awards for her leadership.

Attorney Twyla Rubin of the Philippines Commission on Human Rights: Advocating for family planning and the country’s Reproductive Health Law;

Pooja Badarinath of the Asian-Pacific Resource and Research Centre for Women (ARROW):  Examining how to safeguard family planning and sexual and reproductive health and rights in increasingly conservative environments; and

Gillian Le of the Nossal Institute for Global Health, Melbourne:  Co-author of country case studies on how to convince governments and the private sector to invest more in family planning services at a time of shrinking financial support from traditional donor countries and the UN system itself.

Those not in Bangkok can join us via Facebook Live at www.facebook.com/UNFPAAsiaPacific, from 10am to noon Bangkok time on Tuesday, July 11.

Event Flow

9:30 am – 9:55 am: Registration / Coffee-Tea

10:00 am – 10:05 am: Opening Remarks: Yoriko Yasukawa, Regional Director, UNFPA Asia-Pacific

10:05 am – 10:09 am: Short Film: “Thailand’s Condom King” (BBC)

10:10 am – 11:10 am: Mechai Viravaidya: Remarkable Life, Remarkable Legacy: Keynote and Tribute

11:10 am – 11:40 am: Special Panel: The Right to Decide: Family Planning at a Crossroads in Asia-Pacific

11:40am – 11:55am: Q&A with the audience

11:55am – Noon:  Closing Remarks: Dr Thongchai Lertwilairatanapong, Deputy Director-General of the Department of Health, Ministry of Public Health

Watch video of 45 years of UNFPA Work for Thailand

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RSVP

Siriporn Mongkolcheep ( mongkolcheep@unfpa.org )

Media interviews

Matthew Taylor, UNFPA Asia-Pacific: taylor@unfpa.org  / +66 84 438 2815

Kullwadee Kai Sumalnop, UNFPA Thailand: sumalnop@unfpa.org / +66 2 687 0130