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Fertility transition in Ethiopia: A study using reproductive outcome measures of Bongaarts and Casterline

Mezgebo Gebretsadikan, Mekele University
Krishna Ponnapalli, International Institute for Population Sciences (IIPS)

Bongaarts and Casterline in their 2018 study of “fertility preferences and reproductive outcomes in the developing world” indicates that one can perfectly explain the progress in fertility transition (FT) in terms of a change overtime in the desired family size (DFS). They further state that in the end of FT countries where the DFS is very low, one can find ‘highest unplanned pregnancies.’ Their findings are based on developing and analyzing a selected set of ‘total’ reproductive outcome measures (TROMs) taking demographic health survey (DHS) data of 53 developing countries of various regions of the world, out of which 31 countries observed to be from Sub-Saharan Africa. All the evidence from the EDHS data of 2000 to 2016 indicates that Ethiopia and its regions also undergoing a change in its FT. The objective of the present study is thus to understand the FT in Ethiopia and its regions in terms of DFS and TROMs developed by Bongaarts and Casterline. To reach the goal a set of regression models were developed to derive DFS and TROMs, using the 53 countries data provided by Bongaarts and Casterline. Results indicates that FT in Ethiopia well in progress.

Keywords: Fertility and childbirth, Methodology

See extended abstract.

  Presented in Session 179. Fertility Transition and Prospects