POVERTY, RCH-CARE UTILIZATION AND FERTILITY IN INDIA: A DISTRICT LEVEL ANALYSIS

ABSTRACT: The study highlights interlinkages amongst district level poverty, socioeconomic developmental indices, RCH-care utilization and fertility. Thereby the study formulates a recursive model to highlight the structural linkages between marriage age patterns, contraception, antenatal and delivery care, children’s immunization and fertility. The parametric estimates of the recursive structural system are based on data for 504 districts of India on relevant parameters from alternate sources like district level household surveys – reproductive and child health (DLHS-RCH), center for monitoring Indian economy (CMIE), censuses, etc. The elicited parametric estimates are utilized to elicit the partial and total effects of exogenous or predetermined socioeconomic and cultural variables on the endogenous variables in the system. The study highlights strong interlinkages between fertility, contraception, marriage age patterns, antenatal and delivery care, and immunization. The elicited parametric estimates also facilitate prioritization of RCH parameters like contraception, delivery care and immunization towards fertility containment. Furthermore, women’s empowerment enabling factors like female education and employment, and socioeconomic infrastructure characteristics like road connectivity, hospital beds and ANMs also depict substantially higher total compared with partial inhibitive effects on fertility. Poverty alleviation can facilitate much stronger impact on fertility reduction and thus quicken the process of population stabilization in India