2012-07-11
Xinhua
Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni on Tuesday left for the British capital, London to attend an international summit on family planning scheduled to start on Wednesday.

A State House statement issued here said that the summit which is running under the theme "Global Motherhood: Pushing for Family Planning To Save Lives", is being jointly hosted by the British government and the U.S. based Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

According to the organizers, the aim of the Summit is to launch a global movement to provide an additional 120 million women in the world's poorest countries access to lifesaving family planning information, services and supplies by 2020.

Statistics by the United Nations Population Fund shows that Uganda has one of the highest growth rates in the world at 3.2 percent.

An average Ugandan woman will give birth to about seven children during her lifetime.

Over 40 percent of women who want to use family panning methods cannot get them leading to unwanted pregnancies at times unsafe abortions, according to the country's ministry of health.