Impact of female education on fertility in Uganda

Abstract

This study examined the impact of education on fertility in Uganda using UDHS (2016) data. In order to examine the impact of education on fertility, the study examined the effect of demographic factors such as age, marital status and age at first marriage; socio-economic factors including education levels, income levels and employment status; socio-cultural factors such as religion, region and place of residence plus intermediate factors such as marriage patterns, frequency of sexual activity and access to and use of contraceptives on fertility. The findings further indicated that Age in 5 years age group, place of residence, highest educational level, wealth index, type of earnings are highly significant at p-value (0.00) and women aged 45- 49 with low fertility have the highest percentage of 93%, and based on place of residence women in urban areas with low fertility make up the highest percentage while respondents who have the highest level of education with low fertility constitutes the highest percentage of 95.7%. Women with the highest wealth index with low fertility have the highest percentage of 93.4% and those who earn cash only with low fertility contributes the highest percentage of 90.5%. Also, region and religion are significant at p-value of 0.0002 and 0.0047 respectively where women in central region with low fertility constitutes the highest percentage of 90.3%and basing on religion women with no religion with low fertility contributes to the highest percentage of 93.2% followed by Catholics wilt low fertility with makes up 89.6% while age at first sex is insignificant since its p-value (0.0773) which is greater than 0.05. As such, the study recommends policies that are directed towards lowering fertility rates amongst women of the reproductive age such as promoting girl child education across the country as one way of reducing early pregnancies among young girls. Furthermore, the government is encouraged to offer basic economic activities for women as a way empowering them economically so that they are not seated at home waiting for their men and thus child bearing.