IFFS 2025 Tokyo Declaration · Reproductive Health and Human Rights
Ten principles now a soft international law coming into force.
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In April 2025 the IFFS opened its Declaration on Reproductive and Human Rights for signature in Tokyo. The document, created by the IFFS Jurist Group and the IFFS Executive Committee, contains 10 principles, and adoption by interested societies can be in full or with reservations.
The IFFS Tokyo Declaration stipulates that upon signing by the 35th society the document comes into force and becomes soft international law. To date 48 societies have signed the IFFS Declaration, these organisations and societies representing 65% of world population.
The IFFS Tokyo Declaration does not ask for any existing law to change. Each of the 10 principles refers to an existing article of international law. Examples of instruments states have already signed: the ICCPR on equality before the law, the ICESCR on the highest attainable standard of health, CEDAW on access to family planning, the Convention on the Rights of the Child on identity and best interests, and the Declaration of Geneva on a physician's duty to human rights.
- ICCPR
- International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
- ICESCR
- International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
- CEDAW
- Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women
The ten principles
Select a principle to read it in full.
Fertility education, assessment, diagnosis and treatment available to everyone who wishes to form a family that includes children.
Health coverage in every country should support people who need reproductive care, assessment, diagnosis and treatment.
Access to fertility education, assessment, diagnosis and treatment should be provided free from discrimination on race, colour, sex, gender, language, religion, opinion, origin, property, birth or other status.
Fertility and infertility care must never involve exploitation or trafficking of parents, surrogates, donors, or the people born as a result.
Fertility and infertility care must be provided in a language each party understands, at a level they comprehend, without undue influence or coercion.
Select a principle to read it in full.
Where surrogacy is practised, each party should be provided with independent advice and counselling — independent of clinics and agents.
The right to self-determination is retained throughout any treatment received. No one should be held or detained against their will.
Safe, high-quality care should be provided through assessment, pregnancy, miscarriage or termination, and birth, whether live or otherwise.
During and following therapy, legal parentage must be recognised and access to medical history, identity and genetic heritage.
Pertinent to certain treatments, medical records kept in perpetuity, so people born through donation or surrogacy can trace their origins.
The International Federation of Fertility Societies (IFFS) 2025 Tokyo Declaration describes universal and fundamental principles supporting reproductive health rights of all parties seeking access to fertility care. We invite all national fertility, jurist and andrology societies as well as any other organisations interested in promoting its message to familiarise themselves with the IFFS Tokyo Declaration and consider signing it.
The Calls to Action are simple:
- Signatories should inform policy makers of the existence of this global soft law called the IFFS Tokyo Declaration.
- Policy makers should facilitate national laws that promote the 10 principles, whenever such practices are allowed by Constitution.
- Support groups should advise policy makers to facilitate implementation of the principles for the benefit of women and men in need.
The forty-eight
From the African Federation of Fertility Societies to the Uruguayan Society of Human Reproduction, in the order IFFS publishes them.
Source document: IFFS 2025 Tokyo Declaration: Reproductive Health and Human Rights, opened for signature 29 April 2025 at the IFFS World Congress, Tokyo. Drafted by the IFFS Board and the IFFS Special Interest Jurist Group.Lead contributors: IFFS Executive Committee, IFFS Appointees and Advisors, IFFS Board of Directors, IFFS Past Presidents, IFFS Next Generation Team and IFFS Special Interest Jurist Group. https://www.iffsreproduction.orgData Support: Portnov AgencyManagement and Operations: IFFS Secretariat - ICS EventsDemographic data: United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division — World Population Prospects 2024. Basemap © Mapbox © OpenStreetMap.Visualisations, Designed and Developed by: Heel Turn
World Population Prospects 2024 is published under CC BY 3.0 IGO. Boundaries and names shown do not imply official endorsement or acceptance by the United Nations. The thirteen projection variants are scenarios, not confidence intervals.
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