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The Future Fertility of High Fertility Countries: A Model Incorporating Expert Arguments
Anne Goujon
2013
This paper presents and justifies a set of assumptions regarding the future of fertility in high-fertility countries based on an overview of fertility experiences in these countries, a review of factors influencing fertility change, a global survey of experts, and a final experts' meeting. Future fertility trends in high fertility countries, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia will be the main determinants of global population growth over the rest of this century. Accordingly, this paper describes the diversity of experiences of the countries with currently high fertility, from those well advanced in the fertility transition to countries that have barely started. The expert survey emphasizes the importance of female education, urbanization and access to family planning in fertility declines. The literature review confirms these judgements. The paper ends with a technical description of the procedure for deriving the assumptions for projecting fertility in high fert...
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Revisiting demographic transition: correlation and causation in the rate of development and fertility decline
Jane O'Sullivan
2013
This study takes a retrospective look at the time c ourse of total fertility rate (TFR) and the main factors purported to influence fertility rate, per capita wealth, female education and population-focused voluntary family planning programs. It was found that countries that implemented strong family planning programs achieved fertility reduction much faster and earlier than comparable countries that did not. Fer tility decline typically preceded marked increases in wealth, but per capita wealth growth u sually accelerated when fertility fell to between two and three births per woman. Thus the negative relationship between TFR and GDP per capita tends to be deeply concave for those countries that have achieved relatively low fertility. Higher fertility countries in the sa me region tend to follow a parallel course, but at a slower pace, and most with current fertility a bove three are yet to see sustained wealth increase. Girls’ educational attainment was found t o be neither a pre-...
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Fertility decline in the modern world and in the original demographic transition: Testing three theories with cross-national data
Stephen Sanderson
Population and Environment, 2000
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International political economy and future fertility trends
Alicia Adsera
When I was asked what would be the most important factor likely to influence fertility in the near future, my first inclination was to focus on countries experiencing very low fertility, particularly European and East Asian nations. Out of the multiple factors that are bound to have large effects on childbearing behaviour in low-fertility advanced nations-and, eventually, in less developed settings as well-I wish to highlight three examples. First, the continuous postponement of first births (and the associated challenges for fecundity), combined with the growing role of artificial reproduction techniques (ART) and genetic manipulation, could raise new ethical issues surrounding births. Second, a deepening of the current structural changes in the labour market, which have led to reductions in jobs in mid-skilled occupations and increases in more unstable positions at the low end of the market, may lead to a further flattening or even a reversal of the educational gradients of fertility (Adserà 2017). Third, the digitalisation of society, which is characterised by the dominance of social media and the internet as an information source, may affect childbearing decisions differentially across socioeconomic groups and origins. Indeed, recent research suggests that the internet is already having a significant effect on fertility patterns; although determining which mechanisms are at work in this association remains an open research agenda (Billari et al. 2019). Nevertheless, as policy efforts to raise fertility in low-fertility countries have shown, the margins for changing fertility levels in those settings are limited (Gauthier 2007). When looking at the current levels across the world, we can see that the largest potential margins of change in overall fertility levels are in Sub-Saharan Africa. Table 1 shows UN Population Division estimates of the total fertility rate by Sustainable Development Goal regions. Africa, Western Asia, South Asia, and Central Asia are the only regions that are expected to end this decade with fertility rates above replacement level and, within those regions, Sub-Saharan Africa is a clear outlier, with an average total fertility rate of close to five.
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New Cohort Fertility Forecasts for the Developed World: Rises, Falls, and Reversals
Mikko Myrskyla
Population and Development Review, 2013
The 1970s worries of the "population bomb" were replaced in the 1990s with concerns of population aging driven by falling birth rates. Across the developed world, the nearly universallyused fertility indicator, the period total fertility rate, fell well below two children per woman. However, declines in period fertility have largely been an artifact of later -but not necessarily less -childbearing. We produce new estimates of the actual number of children women have over their lifetimes -cohort fertility -for 37 developed countries. Our results suggest that family size has remained high in many "low fertility" countries. For example, cohort fertility averages 1.8 for the 1975 birth cohort in the 37 countries for which average period total fertility rate was only 1.5 in 2000. Moreover, we find that the long-term decline in cohort fertility has flattened or reversed in all world regions previously characterized by low fertility. These results are robust to statistical forecast uncertainty and the impact of the late 2000s recession. An application of the new forecasts analyzing the determinants of cohort fertility finds that the key dimensions of development that have been hypothesized to be important for fertility -general socioeconomic development, per capita income, and gender equality -are all positively correlated with fertility for the 1970s cohorts. Gender equality, however, emerges as the strongest determinant: where the gap in economic, political, and educational achievement between women and men is small, cohort fertility is high, whereas where the gap is large, fertility is low. Our new cohort fertility forecasts that document the flattening and even reversal of cohort fertility have large implications for the future of population aging and growth, particularly over the long term.
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Childbearing Trends and Prospects in Low-Fertility Countries
Anne-Marie Sardon
European studies of population, 2004
The book series European Studies of Population (ESPO) aims at disseminating population and family research, with special relevance for Europe. It may analyse past, present and/or future trends, as well as their determinants and consequences. The character of the series is multidisciplinary, including formal demographic analyses, as well as social, economic and/or historical population and family studies. The following types of studies are of primary importance: (a) internationally relevant studies, (b) European comparative studies, (c) innovative theoretical and methodological studies, and (d) policy-relevant scientific studies. The series may include monographs, edited volumes and reference works. The book series is published under the auspices of the European Associaiton for Population Studies (EAPS)
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Conducting Inferential Statistical Analysis on Total Fertility and Development in 54 countries
Krystal Zwiesineyi Chindori - Chininga
Contrary to what was hypothesized, it is peculiar that annGDP is positively correlated with under 5 mortality. It is commonly believed that economic maturity is correlated with better health conditions and therefore lower rates of under 5 mortality (Andrade & Filho, 2015). AnnGDP is also negatively correlated with womensEdu and SkillBirths suggesting that an increase in annGDP is correlated with a decrease in womensEdu and SkillBirths rates. An explanation for this may have been explored by Nyoni and Bonga when they suggested that initial stages of growth manifest different demographic trends than implied by the demographic transition model (Nyoni & Bonga, 2017). In this study we see that logical deductions regarding the relationship between total fertility can be made, such as it’s relationship with under-5 mortality. Still, there is ambiguity as to the real role that socioeconomic progress has on fertility, and vice versa, due to anomalies regarding culture, economic growth patterns and the like. Many models for understanding development were established at a time when much of the ‘developed’ world was predominantly located in the Global North. As we see with anomalous cases such as India, South Africa and even new economic sprouts like Rwanda, the trends that dominated the narrative of the rise of countries like the US, and the UK, do not speak to many of the contextual differences that redefine ‘development’ in the Global South. Total fertility is very close to that question as the discussion of how many children to have, women’s rights and opportunities, is very often cultural as much as it is economic. This study has further showcased the variability of the correlation of fertility when we do weigh it against variables such as education or economics, which do not consider culture. Continued analysis is required to establish what variables and discussions are most relevant to the changing development trends and can best demonstrate socioeconomic progress, cognizant of its cultural influences and context.
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Low Fertility in Historical Perspective
massimo bacci
Population and Development Review, 2013
in the last few years, several asian populations have joined europe in the low-fertility league. in 2010 total fertility rates in Japan, South Korea, taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapore were below 1.4, around the level found in Germany, italy, Spain, ukraine, and Poland. at the slightly higher level of 1.6 are China, russia, and thailand, as well as the total populations of east and north east asia (1.5 billion) and of europe (0.7 billion). the worried voices of demographers, sociologists, economists, and political scientists have given increased attention to what they perceive as the deleterious consequences of sustained very low fertility. the crucial question is whether low fertility is becoming a long-lasting feature not only of western societies but also of all those populations that are slowly emerging from secular poverty: poverty of knowledge and poverty of resources. in this essay i offer some reflections on low fertility and on its incidence in the past.
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Population dynamics in an age of declining fertility
Samuel H. Preston
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The Low Fertility Trap Hypothesis. Forces that May Lead to Further Postponement and Fewer Births in Europe
Leen Hordijk
Vienna Yearbook of Population Research, 2008
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