Population Explosion and Family Planning

• (a) Pre-Industrial Phase: In this stage the birth rate (natality rate) was high, death rate (mortality rate) and infant mortality rate were also high leading to a slow multiplication of population. Societies were economically backward with agriculture being the main occupation. Development in medicine was very slow and high death rate could not be checked.
• (b) Early Phases of Industrialization: With the improvement in drinking water facilities, improved sanitation and knowledge of hygiene, development of medical science and also better transport, the death rate declined but the birth rate stayed high. As a result of high birth rate and low mortality rate, population began to grow faster. In Europe, this period of rapid population explosion is called the “transition phase”. It lasted for three centuries and brought about a seven-fold increase in population.
• (c) Population Dynamics in Industrial Society: Here death rate is checked because of improved medicine and other aspects of social and natural environment. It is also realized that since resources are limited, a proper upbringing of children is possible if family size is limited. Along with a chance in value structure, the innovation of birth control technology paves the way for family planning. Birth rate is also reduced. With reduction in both birth and death rates, a stable population could be achieved.

This analysis in terms of three phases is referred to as the “demographic-transition” theory. Most countries of developing world have been caught on the second stage. Death rate has, of course, been checked, but a high birth rate is gradually leading to a rapid increasing multitude, or what is often called the “population explosion”. Though birth control methods exist, they are not popularly used by rural people because of a large number of traditional factors. The problem in family planning is to check fertility. Since women have a great fertility, the number of live births should be reduced. This would not only provide an opportunity to couples to give the best to their children, but also free women from constant duties of bearing and rearing. Thus, women would be able to contribute to productive process and nation-building. Fertility depends on the age at which women marry; the period when they remain in fertility union and the rapidity with which they build their families. A study reports that age of marriage in the case of women has increased from 12.6 in the 1921-31 decade to 19.9 in the 1951-61 decade. In the case of men, it has remained constant at 20. An increase of roughly three years in the age of women at marriage within a span of twenty years has contributed to a three per cent decline in birth rate. The mass adoption of family planning practices also requires a change in the value-structure. Indian experience shows that coercive methods of family planning have usually failed.