The United Nations World Fertility Report 2024 has revealed Pakistan’s fertility rate is rapidly declining. According to the report, the fertility birth rate has dropped from six births per woman in 1996 to 3.6 in 2024.
The report stressed that Pakistan needs to introduce strong measures to reduce adolescent birth rates in order to improve socioeconomic conditions for families.
“Reducing adolescent birth rates through targeted interventions offers profound socioeconomic benefits, that can also further accelerate fertility declines. Reducing growth in the numbers of live births in the future would allow governments and families to allocate resources more efficiently to invest in children and adolescent health and well-being,” the report said.
Furthermore, the report stressed that one of the ways this could be achieved was through banning child marriages, which allows more women to seek education and other employment opportunities, as well as better access to sexual and reproductive health care services, an end to gender-based violence and better maternal care for young mothers.
“Governments should also strengthen laws and enforcement mechanisms to protect the rights of girls and women including laws to ban child marriage and laws and regulations that guarantee full and equal access to sexual and reproductive health care, information and education.”
The report said that 22 per cent of the global population lived in 63 countries that is still in the early stages of demographic transition, and is likely to reach low fertility by 2054. Global fertility rates have significantly fallen since the last century, from the average 4.8 births per woman in 1970 to now 2.2 in 2024.
