An intro to fertility

1. Changing populations and
places
3. Fertility

2. Syllabus link
Population change and demographic transition
over time, including
• natural increase
• fertility rate
• life expectancy
• population structure
• dependency ratios

3. Term Recap
Crude Birth Rate
Total number of births in a single year per 1000 of the
population.
General Fertility Rate
The number of live berths per 1,000 women aged 15–49
in one year.
Total Fertility Rate
The average number of children born to a woman in her
lifetime.

6. Fertility Key Points
• Fertility is still high in most of the least developed
countries and although it is expected to decline, it
will remain higher than the rest of the world.
• In the rest of the developing countries, fertility
has declined markedly since the late 1960’s and is
expected to reach below replacement level by
2050 in the majority of these countries.
• Below replacement fertility prevails in the
developed regions and is expected to continue to
2050.

7. Fertility Key Points
• Replacement level fertility is the level of
fertility at which a population exactly replaces
itself from generation to generation.
• In developed countries, replacement level
fertility can be taken as an average of 2.1 per
woman.
• In countries with high infant mortality rates,
however, the average number of births may
need to be much higher.

9. What factors
affect fertility
rates?