HUMAN DEVELOPMENT REPORT FOR BRAZIL - 1996

As the consequence of various factors, a new demographic pattern is being established in Brazil which will have profound implications and will determine important changes in many policies, chiefly in the areas of health, education, housing, sanitation, urban expansion, transport and social security.

Actually the demographic pattern has been changing since the end of the decade of 1960, especially as a result of the decline of mortality rates as from the 1940s, which caused life expectancy at birth to climb from 41 years in 1930 to 54 years in 1960. The fertility rate (number of children per woman), meanwhile, continued to be high, up to the middle of the 1960s, declining slightly only in the South and Southeast and increasing in other regions. Due to this, the global rate declined only from 6.5 children to 5.8. And the combination of the two factors—high fertility, low mortality—caused a considerable rise in the average population growth rate in this period. It climbed from 2.4% per year in the decade of 1940 to 3.0% in the 1950s and 2.9% in the 1960s.

It may be worth remembering that in a "closed" population—without entry and departure of migrants—the distribution per age bracket is the product of the rates of mortality and fertility, but mainly the latter. Contrary to widespread belief, when a drop in mortality occurs, the result is the rejuvenation of the population (a decline in infant/juvenile mortality). On the other hand, high fertility rates result in a young age distribution in the population, whilst low fertility results in a relatively aged population (as is happening in Europe and the United States).

As the Brazilian population continues to be basically closed and with fertility levels high and stable, the distribution by age brackets remained constant and young between 1940 and 1970, despite the rapid decline of mortality and the quickening of the population growth rate. During all this period, about 52% of the population had less than 20 years of age.

But at the end of the 1960s, a rapid and generalised process of decline in fertility began, which until then was limited to the more privileged social groups in the more developed regions. It spread to all social classes and regions. The fertility rate fell from 5.8 sons per woman in 1970 to 4.3 in 1975 and to 3.6 in 1984, which corresponds to a drop of more than 37% in just 15 years, rather quickly when compared to any experience in another country.

Between 1970 and 1980 the total fertility rate dropped by more than 35% in the South, about 20% in the North and Northeast, more than 30% in the Centre-West, and around 25% in the Southeast. The average rate for the country fell by 26%. Even the rate in the rural zone fell by more than 20%.

The data of the 1991 Census confirm this tendency of rapid decline in fertility in Brazil. Contrary to expectations, the population in 1991 reached the figure of only 147 million. (There was talk of 16% and even of 170 million.) The average population growth rate had already fallen between 1980 and 1991 to 1.9% per year, as against 2.4% in the decade of 1970.

Preliminary estimates based partly on data from the last Census indicated for 1991 a total fertility rate of between 2.4 and 2.9 children per woman of fertile age. Even with the highest number -- 2.9 -- there would be a marked decline between 1980 and 1991 of 33% in the Brazilian fertility rate, much more significant than that observed between 1970 and 1980.

When these preliminary Census figures for 1991 were divulged, a good portion of the communication agencies, while acknowledging the slowing down of the population growth rate, drew attention to the rate of 1.9% per year in the demographic growth—and this rate, projected for the following decades, would lead to the doubling of the population in less than 37 years. Some analyses based on this calculation suggested the urgency for a birth control policy.

But this expectation is based on a false premise, since it is impossible to maintain the growth rate of the population at 1.9% per year unless fertility starts to rise again markedly, and this would be contrary to international experience and to direct observations carried out in the country.

In reality, the rate itself of 1.9% per year was "artificially" high, because in the 1980s Brazilian women of fertile age—nearly all born before the decline in fertility—made up a relatively big contingent, and this meant an "artificially" high birth rate. Were it not for this circumstance, the population growth rate, instead of being 1.9%, would have been somewhere near 0.9% per year.

In the medium and long term, even this last rate tends to become reduced, as the fertility should continue to drop. It may be affirmed with conviction that the decline in fertility in Brazil is not a conjunctural phenomenon but an irreversible process, within what is known in demography as " demographic transition".

Information on the use of contraceptives in the country reinforce this. In 1986, 70% of married women aged between l5 and 44 were using some kind of contraceptive. 42% of the women were already sterilised (an irreversible method) and 38% took contraceptive pills. These are very efficient methods, but presupposes the wish to have smaller families.

More recent surveys in the Northeast and in São Paulo municipality in 1991 and 1992 confirm this tendency and reveal that between 1986 and 1991 the proportion of women in fertile age that use contraceptive methods increased. In the Northeast, 54% of all women in the reproductive age had used for some time or other contraceptive methods, and 39% were still using them at the time of the survey. In São Paulo, these figures were 77% and 58% respectively. The pill and sterilisation were the methods used by 75% of the women in São Paulo and 86% in the Northeast. In São Paulo, the pill is more utilised than surgical sterilisation (38 against 36%). In the Northeast, the latter procedure was preponderant and its practice had increased in relation to 1986 (63% as against 47%). Use of the pill had fallen from 32 to 23%.

In the Northeast,19% of the women were already sterilised before the age of 25, as against 10% in São Paulo. The average ages at the time of sterilisation in the two regions are close: 29.7 and 3l.0 years. (In 1986 these average ages were 36.6 years in the Northeast and 38.2 in São Paulo.) The average number of sons already born per woman at the time of sterilisation fell from 3.6 to 3.0 in the Northeast in this same period of 1986 to 1991, while in São Paulo the figure continued stable (2.7).

It may also be worth mentioning that while in 1986 most of the women who opted for surgical sterilisation mentioned "health problems" as the reason for it. In 1992, 62% in São Paulo justified this by saying they did not wish to have more children.

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