THE SOUTH-AFRICAN FERTILITY DECLINE

Until recently, less has been known about demographic change in South Africa than in many other sub-Saharan African countries. This situation is now changing with the publication of analyses based on household fertility surveys. Each of the country's four 'racial' groups is seen to have participated in demographic transitions albeit at distinctly different times. The fertility of black South Africans (numerically by far the largest of the four groups) began to decline in the early 1960s, and, with a current total fertility rate of 4.6, this decline represents the earliest and most advanced African fertility transition south of the Sahara. The decline has been assisted by a vigorous national family planning program, which helps to answer the question as to how African fertility might be affected if Asian-type family planning programs were implemented elsewhere in sub-Saharan Africa.