The Most Precious Curse.(necklace aids in rhythm control form of contraception, Philippines)

For Wensley and Lilian Hidalgo, the choice was clear. The devout Roman Catholic couple living in the misty northern Philippine city of La Trinidad couldn't afford to have a third child. "No more children! Life's too hard now," says 40-year-old Lilian, laughing, bundled in sweaters against the winter chill. "I first heard about the necklace from a midwife in our neighborhood. It seemed simple and natural, so we decided to try it." What she and her husband decided to experiment with is a relatively recent idea in population control--the standard days or "necklace" method. Women use color-coded beads on a necklace to determine when it's safe to have sex without getting pregnant. Beads for the fertile days of the month glow in the dark, giving couples no excuse for missing the point in an unlit bedroom. "At first the husbands were hesitant, especially about the middle part of the necklace. It was too long, they said, 12 days without sex," says midwife Virginia Rivera, referring to the white beads that indicate the unsafe days for sex. "But many of the husbands got used to it."

Philippine officials had better hope so. Population numbers are just about the only figures on an upward tick in recent years. The country's populace grew an average of 2.5 percent per year during the last half of the 1990s while economic growth staggered into negative territory after the Asian financial crisis in 1998. While per capita GDP continues to slide, the birthrate threatens to double the country's population of 80 million within the next 30 years.

The threat--to government finances, unemployment rolls, an already crowded school system--is obvious. But in a country where the vast majority of voters are Catholic, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo has been careful not to let family-planning efforts offend--or damage politically prized relations with the Catholic Church. While the national economy grew a faster-than-expected 4.6 percent last year, experts remain worried that a modestly larger economic pie will not be large enough to feed such a swelling population. "This population growth is simply not sensible for the economy," says Peter Wallace, head of Manila-based economic think tank Wallace Business Forum. "You see it not only in per capita GDP but in malnutrition, in stunted growth and in undereducation."

Family planning in the Philippines must walk a fine line. Aggressive birth-control campaigning--handing out pills or ...