Patterns of fertility change in Ghana: a time and space perspective

This article examines fertility change in Ghana based on a time and space perspective. The sample draws on three birth cohorts of women born in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, resident in five distinct societies selected from three settlements in Ghana. The findings of the study show that fertility change is occurring in a socioeconomic and geographically distinct manner. Significant fertility declines are traced to the 1960 birth cohorts in all the study areas. For the 1970 cohort this decline continues in the elite areas whereas the urban indigenous areas exhibit a rise in teenage fertility which is not, however, followed by higher fertility after the age of 20. In the rural area fertility rises from the 1960 to the 1970 cohort up to age 24, which is the end point of study for this cohort. The spatial variability between the five study areas has profound implications for the ongoing fertility change in Ghana and Sub-Saharan Africa.