Stalls in Fertility Transitions in sub‐Saharan Africa: Revisiting the Evidence

Schoumaker, Bruno

doi:10.1111/sifp.12098

Cited by 64 publications

(69 citation statements)

References 31 publications

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“…Over the last decade, fertility stalls and/or reversals were documented in several African countries. The number varies according to authors—anywhere from 12 (Bongaarts , ) to 6 (Garrenne and Joseph ; Garenne ) to 2 (Schoumaker )—but there is a fairly robust consensus that stalls occurred in at least a handful of countries (Schoumaker ; Westoff and Cross ; Machiyama ). Even where declines did not reverse or come to a full halt, they slowed noticeably in many African countries in the latter 1990s and early 2000s (Bongaarts ).…”

Section: Why Monitor Fertility Inequality?mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Fertility transitions are more likely to stall, and the dividends from these transitions are less likely to be evenly shared, if transitions occur in a top‐down manner that increases fertility inequality. Studies of fertility inequality can thus inform both scientific concerns over stalling transitions (Bongaarts ; Garenne ; Schoumaker ) and policy concerns over the prospects for a shared dividend in sub‐Saharan Africa (Bloom et al. ).…”

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confidence: 99%

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African Transitions and Fertility Inequality: A Demographic Kuznets Hypothesis

Eloundou‐Enyegue¹,

Giroux²,

Tenikue³

2017

Population & Development Rev

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Section: Why Monitor Fertility Inequality?mentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

African Transitions and Fertility Inequality: A Demographic Kuznets Hypothesis

Eloundou‐Enyegue¹,

Giroux²,

Tenikue³

2017

Population & Development Rev

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“…Despite these similarities, SSA in the 2000s did not follow the path of rapid fertility decline observed in Asian and Latin American countries in the 1970s and 1980s. Fertility declines in SSA over the past two decades have been slow and in several countries, fertility has stalled (Bongaarts, 2008;Schoumaker, 2019). The UN projects a slower future fertility transition in the SSA than in the 70s in Asia and Latin America (United Nations, Population Division, 2019).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Trends in fertility and fertility preferences in sub-Saharan Africa: the roles of education and family planning programs

Bongaarts

2020

Genus

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A common explanation for the high fertility prevailing in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) is a widespread desire for large families. This situation poses a challenge to population policy-makers in the continent. If the desired family size is high, then presumably family planning programs can only have a limited effect on fertility because these programs aim to assist women in achieving their reproductive goals. But this conclusion is based on the assumption that family planning programs do not affect the desired family size, which is questionable and is investigated here. This study examines the determinants of trends wanted and unwanted fertility in SSA using fixed-effects regressions of country-level data. The dependent variables include the total fertility rate, and its wanted and unwanted components. Explanatory variables include a family planning program score and four socioeconomic variables (women’s educational attainment, child mortality, GNI per capita, and percent urban). Data come from 103 DHS surveys in 25 countries in SSA with at least two DHS surveys between 1989 and 2019. Women’s education and family planning programs are found to be the dominant determinants of fertility decline and their effects operate by reducing both wanted and unwanted fertility. The effects of education are not surprising but the finding that family planning programs can reduce wanted fertility implies that their impact can be larger than conventional wisdom suggests. Indeed, in a few poor countries, the implementation of high-quality programs has been associated with substantial declines in wanted fertility (e.g., Ethiopia, Malawi, Rwanda). The mechanism through which this effect operates is unclear but likely involves media programs that diffuse knowledge about the benefits of smaller families.

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“…The steady decline in global fertility that began about 1965 stalled in many countries from the mid-1990s ( [9]; for Africa, see [10]). Limitations in contraceptive use, family planning programs [11,12] and education [13] may be involved in the stall, impeding efforts to reduce population growth.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Human fertility in relation to education, economy, religion, contraception, and family planning programs

2020

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Background: The world population is expected to increase greatly this century, aggravating current problems related to climate, health, food security, biodiversity, energy and other vital resources. Population growth depends strongly on total fertility rate (TFR), but the relative importance of factors that influence fertility needs more study. Methods: We analyze recent levels of fertility in relation to five factors: education (mean school years for females), economy (Gross Domestic Product, GDP, per capita), religiosity, contraceptive prevalence rate (CPR), and strength of family planning programs. We compare six global regions: E Europe, W Europe and related countries, Latin America and the Caribbean, the Arab States, Sub-Saharan Africa, and Asia. In total, 141 countries are included in the analysis. We estimate the strength of relationships between TFR and the five factors by correlation or regression and present the results graphically. Results: In decreasing order of strength, fertility (TFR) correlates negatively with education, CPR, and GDP per capita, and positively with religiosity. Europe deviates from other regions in several ways, e.g. TFR increases with education and decreases with religiosity in W Europe. TFR decreases with increasing strength of family planning programs in three regions, but only weakly so in a fourth, Sub-Saharan Africa (the two European regions lacked such programs). Most factors correlated with TFR are also correlated with each other. In particular, education correlates positively with GDP per capita but negatively with religiosity, which is also negatively related to contraception and GDP per capita. Conclusions: These results help identify factors of likely importance for TFR in global regions and countries. More work is needed to establish causality and relative importance of the factors. Our novel quantitative analysis of TFR suggests that religiosity may counteract the ongoing decline of fertility in some regions and countries.

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Stalls in Fertility Transitions in sub‐Saharan Africa: Revisiting the Evidence

Cited by 64 publications

References 31 publications

African Transitions and Fertility Inequality: A Demographic Kuznets Hypothesis

African Transitions and Fertility Inequality: A Demographic Kuznets Hypothesis

Trends in fertility and fertility preferences in sub-Saharan Africa: the roles of education and family planning programs

Human fertility in relation to education, economy, religion, contraception, and family planning programs

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