harrington-rebecca Mother: Caring for 7 Billion is a thoughtful, engaging documentary about the ever increasing consequences of rapid population growth. Through the use of expert interviews, as well as human stories, the film powerfully advocates for access to comprehensive family planning and education for girls and women as the antidote to explosive population growth, which contributes to environmental degradation, maternal and child mortality, and the cycle of poverty facing many in the developing world. It also draws attention to vast over-consumption and a focus on growth, in which some countries, like the United States, account for a relatively small proportion of the global population, but a large proportion of global resource consumption.Mother is factual, and grounded in a thoughtful theoretical framework; it also tells a story that is powerful and emotional, and that highlights that these issues have real world and real life implications.

rmaskell-459-841435 In 1970, world population was 3.7 billion which was then regarded as a major contributor to the global environmental crisis. By 2011, world population has risen to 6.8 billion and technology has proved to be a double-edged sword: on one hand, increasing life expectancy, food and goods production; on the other, resulting in unsustainable population growth with concomitant major problems for humanity's continued existence. Infrastructure in most countries has failed to keep pace with the growth being relentlessly promoted by various pressure groups, and in some countries, aspirational middle classes that previously did not exist, all wishing to live at the massively unsustainable consumption level of the United States, have been created.Empowerment and education of women is seen as the primary solution to this impending disaster. Despite advances in contraceptive methods, many pregnancies are unplanned even in advanced societies. However, population growth is greatest in patriarchal societies where women are uneducated and disempowered. If fertility rates can be reduced and the present insatiable urge for growth be curbed, the concepts of Mother Earth and women as agents of global survival are twinned.

Karen Gaia Pitts This film examines world population that has grown much too fast in recent years; it adequately warns us of the very serious impacts that will result from this growth; and unwinds the mystery of the population taboo that has kept the subject under wraps for a least a couple of decades.The film interviews some of the early population activists and shows how the opinion of these activists has changed, in the 40 years - since the first Earth Day in 1970 - from the idea of 'population control' to a more gentle but effective solution: women's empowerment, voluntary family planning, and women's control over their reproductive function.The film gives a powerful message that says, when women are informed about the freedom of choice that is given by modern birth control, they usually choose to have smaller families - if they have access to birth control - for the health and well-being of all family members. It tells us that 'population control' is not at all necessary, and leaves us with the idea that the population taboo, if everyone watches this film, will be lifted.

Chris Bystroff It will probably take about 100 years to reach population equilibrium on Earth, and then only if we consciously seek it, starting now. "Mother" starts the discussion by pointing out, first, that we have a very serious problem, and then through the voices of experts and visionaries Mother tells us what will happen if we don't address the problem. Then the movie focuses our attention on the one and only way to peacefully and painlessly decrease the population -- through family planning. And family planning requires female empowerment. The movie tears away the curtain of despair and denial, eschews violent and unethical reactions, avoids placing the blame, and shows us how to navigate though these uncertain times by empowering women. I wish I could see a sequel. It would cover the technology of contraception, the demographic pyramid, and the belief systems that stand in the way of controlling our reproduction rate. To answer the question of the previous reviewer, yes, zero population growth could be attained today if no pregnancies were unplanned.