Fertility transition in selected sub-Saharan African countries: the role of family planning programs

Abstract

Background: Change in fertility rate across societies is a complex process that involves changes in the demand for children, the diffusion of new attitudes about family planning and greater accessibility to contraception provided by family planning programs. Among the neo-Malthusian adherents, it is believed that rapid population growth strain countries’ capacity and performance. Fertility has, however, decelerated in most countries in the recent past. Scholars have concentrated on wide range of factors associated with fertility majorly at the national scale. However, considerably less attention has been paid to the fertility preference - a pathway through which various variables act on fertility. The Sub-Saharan African countries’ disparities amid almost similarities in policies is a cause of concern to demographers. Methods: Using Bongaarts reformulation of Easterlin and Crimmins conceptual scheme of 1985 on Demographic and Health Survey Data (DHS) data collected overtime across countries, the understanding of the current transition in general would help to reassess and provide explanations to the observed latest fertility dynamics at play. This study therefore is an attempt to explain the current fertility transition through women’s fertility preference. Results: Results reveal that indeed fertility transition is diverse across countries though generally on a decline course in most of the sub-Saharan countries. The huge disparities in fertility preferences among women of reproductive age and its non-significant change in the implementation indices overtime points at the levels of unmet need to contraception underneath as well as the proportion of demand to family planning commodities satisfied by programs in a bid to allow women implement their fertility desires. Conclusions: It is therefore plausible to conclude that the improvement of the availability and the uptake of quality birth control technologies is one of the most feasible means through which countries can fast track their fertility transitions.