Factors Associated with the Fertility of Internal Migrants in Uganda

Paulino Ariho , Makerere University
Abel Nzabona, Centre for Basic Research, Kampala

Migration is associated with the timing and spacing of births and the final number of children born to a woman after migration which can influence the fertility transition trajectory of a country but fertility studies in Uganda have not explored this. We use the 2016 Uganda and Demographic health survey data to study the fertility of migrant women in Uganda. Four categories; rural to rural, rural to urban, urban to rural and urban to urban were generated basing on current residence and type of their previous residence. Migrants were defined as those women whose duration of stay in current place of residence was one year or less. Tfr2 stata module enabled calculation and reconstruction of fertility since 2001. The Poisson regression model was used to assess the factors associated with fertility using CEB as the fertility measure. The findings indicated that rural to rural migrant women had the highest TFR (5.9) followed by urban to urban (5.0), urban to rural (4.6) and rural to urban (3.7). There were some few differences in the factors associated with fertility of the women in the four migration categories but generally education attainment, ever use if family planning, preferred ideal number of children, marital status were significant in all the categories. There is need for mechanisms to enhance completion of secondary and higher education among women in Uganda and also increased efforts to improve availability, access and affordability of family planning services in rural areas but also strengthen those in the urban areas.

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 Presented in Session P1. Poster Session Fertility, Family and the Life Course