The fertility impact of changes in the timing of childbearing in the developing world.

This study examines the role of tempo effects in the fertility declines of less developed countries. These effects temporarily inflate the total fertility of a population during periods when the age at childbearing declines and deflate it when childbearing is postponed. An analysis of data from the World Fertility Surveys and the Demographic and Health Surveys demonstrates that fertility trends observed in many less developed countries are likely to be distorted by changes in the timing of childbearing. In most countries women are delaying childbearing, which implies that observed fertility is lower than it would have been without tempo changes. This pattern is most clearly documented in Taiwan, where accurate birth statistics from a vital registration system make it possible to estimate the tempo components of fertility annually from 1978 to 1993. The small but unexpected rise in the total fertility of Colombia in the early 1990s is attributed to a decline in the negative tempo distortion that prevailed in the 1980s. Similar interruptions of ongoing fertility declines may occur in the future in other countries when existing negative tempo effects are removed.

[Fertility preferences in Latin America: trends and differentials in seven countries]. / Fecundidad deseada en America Latina: tendencias y diferenciales en siete paises.

The authors use Bongaarts's fertility preference measurement methodology to examine and compare changes in fertility preferences in Colombia, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Jamaica, Peru, and Trinidad and Tobago over the period 1975-1989. "The trends of observed and desired fertility are examined at the national level and by level of education and rural-urban place of residence. The data used comes from fertility surveys....such as the World Fertility Survey (WFS) and the Demographic and Health Survey (DHS). The analysis suggests that the changes in fertility between the dates of the two surveys...are not due to changes in desired fertility, but mainly to differences in the degree to which fertility is controlled to coincide with desired levels.... Both the WFS and the DHS show that unwanted fertility was significant in all countries, specially in the lower socioeconomic strata." (SUMMARY IN ENG)

Breastfeeding: patterns, correlates, and fertility effects.

PIP: Paper based on data generated by the World Fertility Survey in 8 countries: Bangladesh, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Jordan, Peru, Guyana, Colombia, and Panama. The authors address the following issues, among others: the prevalence and duration of breastfeeding; variations in the duration of breastfeeding among different subgroups, classified by age, parity, woman's education, etc,; the key determinants of breastfeeding; and the effect of breastfeeding on fertility. The large majority of women in all the countries breastfed their last 2 children, the number who did not ranging from 2 to 18%. Duration ranged from 9 months (Panama) to 29 months (Bangladesh). Key determinants were women's education, place of residence, husband's occupation, and survival status of the child--consistent for all 8 countries. Women with more education and those living in urban areas breastfeed for shorter periods. Sex of child, age and parity of mother, and mother's work experience showed no independent effect on duration of breastfeeding. Although breastfeeding is not used for family limitation, the possibility that it is used to prolong birth intervals cannot be ruled out. Average length of last closed birth interval increased with prolonged breastfeeding in all 8 countries. 1 month of breastfeeding adds an average of 0.4 months to the birth interval, although there was considerable variation among the countries. To what extent these variations may be due to differences in reporting errors or to other factors could not be determined.^ieng