Surprise surge in Kenya’s population as fertility rises

• Ironically, with Kenya making strides in the fight against HIV/Aids, fewer people are dying, keeping death rates lower than birth rates

The natural increase in population, based on the number of deaths, births and migrations is 2.8 per cent.

Donor funding

Demographers are still pondering whether greater access to contraceptives might have helped rein in the unexpected population rise.

Although demographers hoped that the level of contraceptive use will go beyond 39 per cent, where it stood in 1998, the figure stalled in 2003.

“Because of declining funding, we do not have contraceptive security, meaning we cannot supply as much as we need to,” said Mr Chesiror adding, “we depend too much on donor funding.”

Still unaware
Family Health Options Kenya service delivery manager Esther Muketo said the organisation’s reproductive health programme had suffered from a shift in donor focus from family planning to fighting HIV/Aids.

But NCAPD Coast regional population coordinator Peter Nyakwara said many people are still unaware of available family planning options. Many young women begin child-bearing early due to arranged marriages.

Low literacy levels and poverty are barriers to information and access to contraceptives, especially for rural women.
In other cases, women are bearing more children because of better nutrition and healthcare.

Africa’s population of 967 million is projected to grow to 1.9 billion by 2050, according to the 2008 World Population Data Sheet report.

It says 58 per cent of Kenya’s population lives on less than Sh160 ($2) a day.

The report, released last week, said many African countries were living in poverty with as many as 90 per cent of the population in Tanzania and Nigeria living on less than Sh150 a day.

The report shows that infant and maternal mortality rates are high in Kenya, with 175,000 out of 1.5 million children dying in infancy every year.

A large proportion of those who survive are malnourished with 30 per cent suffering from chronic malnutrition.

About 25 per cent of all child deaths happen in the first month of life, it says, and of these, 17 per cent were due to diarrhoea, 15 per cent to HIV/Aids and 14 per cent were malaria-related.

The 2008 Africa Population Data Sheet said less educated women were more likely to lose their children. It said that 85 infants per 1,000 live births to mothers with primary school education died before one year while 44 out of 1,000 live births to mothers with high school education were dying before celebrating their first birth day.