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Generational shift leaves Uganda expecting demographic dividend
People do last minute Christmas shopping in Kampala on December 23, 2021. The decline in fertility has been reflected in a reduction in the average number of people per household across the country. PHOTO/ ISAAC KASAMANI
What you need to know:
- Experts say demographic dividend will be better realised when the working-age population is given uninterrupted education and skills to drive the economic activities.
There has been a phenomenal 44 percent decline in the number of children each Ugandan woman is bearing in her lifetime, a dynamic that’s shrinking family sizes and triggering demographic transitions.
Separate reports from the National Population Council (NPC) and Makerere University Department of Population Studies indicate that in the 1970s a Ugandan woman was on average producing around nine children. This has since shrunk to five.
The decline in fertility has been reflected in a reduction in the average number of people per household across the country. For instance, between 2012 and 2020 alone, data from the Uganda National Bureau of Statistics (UBOS), indicated a 10 percent decline in the number of households with five or more children—from 58 percent to 48 percent.
This reduction in household size is more notable in urban areas where the median is four. In the countryside, the average household size is around five people. Some sub-regions such as Teso have a slightly high median of six.
Change in tack
But this decline in fertility is against President Museveni’s initial agenda of having a bigger population. The President once thought this a catalyst for national growth through creation of a big market for business, and even a guarantee for the defence of the country in case of an attack.
“Therefore that small population in plentiful resources was a big disadvantage because it meant being organised on a tiny scale when others are organised on a bigger scale. That is why I have been encouraging you people to multiply,” Mr Museveni, while referring to China, told NRM legislators and leaders in 2007 while opening a five-day retreat in Kyankwanzi.
The President’s views at the time were challenged by the likes of Dr Chris Baryomunsi. The Kinkizi East MP argued that encouraging high fertility among women would exacerbate poverty.
“I don’t really agree with the analysis of the President because that has been his position that we need a huge population and that the population should grow as fast as possible,” Dr Baryomunsi said then.
He added: “If we allow the population to just grow rapidly then we are going to get a huge population of very poor people.”
The dissenting views—of the likes of Dr Baryomunsi, experts at NPC and development partners such as the United Nations Population Fund, coupled with the pressure brought on by unemployment—have over the years seen the President have a change of heart.2
Demographic dividend?
Dr Jotham Musinguzi, the NPC director general, while commenting on the reported increased uptake of contraceptives last week, said their campaign for a reduction in fertility rate started yielding results around 2012.
He said the country will see more rapid economic growth if both fertility and mortality decline at a faster rate to create a bigger working-age population as opposed to the current population structure dominated by children and young people who are dependents.
“There is a need to continue investing in the population and reducing fertility in this country by working with the Ministry of Health to promote family planning and use of contraceptives and the Ministry of Education because education is also very important in the reduction of fertility,” he noted.
He added: “We need to link these sectors in the context of the Parish Development Model, which is going to impact the reduction of fertility rapidly so that the country can benefit from the demographic dividend. The demographic dividend is when you reduce fertility and mortality fast enough.”
Dr Musinguzi said the maximum benefit from demographic dividend will be better realised when the working-age population is given uninterrupted education and skills to drive the economic activities in the country.
Dr Simon Kibira, a demographic researcher at Makerere University, told Sunday Monitor that many Ugandan couples could have started appreciating the importance of quality over quantity.
“If I am okay with that standard of [Universal Primary Education], I may have seven children because I am only going to provide scholastic materials, but I will not be paying school fees.” he said, adding, “But if I want my children to go to private schools, to cater for them and ensure that they have shoes, quality healthcare and ensure they have to go to university or even take them abroad, the quality is going to change and so I will want to have few children.”
Prof Winston Muhwezi, a behavioural scientist and the director of research at Advocates Coalition on Development and Environment (ACODE), concurs.
He opines: “It is not cheap to bring up the children…the desire to have so many can be counterproductive…If you are going to have children get good quality health care, good quality education, you cannot handle if they are too many.”
Uganda’s current per capita income is estimated by the Ministry of Finance at $1,039 (Shs3.6m). This income is small for a citizen in a country where basics like healthcare depend on out-of-pocket spending and parents are charged millions of shillings per term for each child in some of the schools.
The low per capita income is more felt in urban areas where people have to pay rent and buy food.
“That is why in urban areas, the number of children per household is lower because the urban people may be starting to see the pinch of the need for money to feed children. In the village one may not need much money to feed children because they can cultivate and grow food,” Dr Kibira reasoned.
But even in rural areas, things have been changing over time partly as a result of erratic rainfall triggered by climate change, declining soil fertility and land fragmentation as population size increases. Up to 12 percent of the rural people moved to urban areas between 2016 and 2020, according to statistics from UBOS.
“But also we know very many ladies in our generation are career-driven unlike our mothers who were basically home,” Prof Muhwezi said.
Working woman
Up to 7.9 million out of 11 million working-age women were employed by 2020, according to information from NPC, and, of these, 43.6 percent were in formal employment. Girls, who are working, are also less likely to have as many children as those women who are not working, according to the Uganda Demographic and Health Survey (UDHS) reports.
But Prof Muhwezi of ACODE says women are no longer marrying at the young age “our parents were marrying.”
In fact, by 1988—according to the government UDHS—the average age when women in the country were producing the first child was around 18.
It increased to 19 years in 2016. The age at first birth is expected to have increased further over the years, except for the effects of pandemic-induced closure of schools which sparked increases in teenage pregnancies.
“People are also beginning to have children later than before because they are going to school—education is the best contraceptive method. If the girls study up to university or other higher institution of learning and they leave school by age 22 or 23,” Dr Kibira said.
He added: “If you compare with someone who didn’t study to that level, by age 16 they are planning to get married like a normal woman because they are not in school.”
Both Prof Muhwezi and Dr Kibira believe that population growth will continue as urbanisation increases because the cost of living is higher and people are pursuing quality living.
By 1988, according to government statistics, 11.5 percent of the estimated 15.9 million population was living in urban areas, but now 27 percent of the estimated 43.6 million Ugandans live in urban areas.
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