The effect of ưomens education on fertility in vietnam

Age-specific fertility rate Crude birth rate Children ever born General Fertility rate General Statistical Office Poisson regression model Total fertility rate U.S.. • Table 2.1: Narrat

VIETNAM- NETHERLANDS PROGRAMME FOR M.A IN DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS

THE EFFECT OF WOMEN'S EDUCATION ON

FERTILITY IN VIETNAM

A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of

MASTER OF ARTS IN DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS

I certify that to the best of my knowledge any help received in preparing this

thesis and all sources used, have been acknowledged in this thesis

LE HOANG THIEN KIM

,

"

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT Firstly, I would like to thank my academic supervisor Dr Nguyen Huu Dung for his valuable advice, comments and making reference materials available

to me Particularly, thanks to these worthy instructions and kindly help from him, I can complete the research

I greatly appreciate Mr Truong Thanh Vu for his technique assistance and valuable comments to the study

Many thanks are respectfully sent to my parents, my husband who are always encourage and sympathize with me

I would like to thank to all teachers and staffs of the Vietnam- Netherlands programme at University of Economics HCM

Finally, I am indebted to Measure DHS Office - ICF Macro, especially Bridgette James- data archive administrator for their assistance and permission to access VDHS 2002 data so that I can complete my thesis

TABLE OF CONTENTS

CERTIFICATION i

A CKN 0 WLEDGEMENT ii

TABLE OF CONTENTS iii

LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES vi

ABBREVIATIONS vii

ABSTRACT viii

CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION !

1.1 Problem Statement 1

1.2 Research objectives 3

1.3 Research questions 3

1.4 Hypotheses 3

1.5 Research Methodology 3

1.6 Structure of the thesis 4

CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW 6

2.1 Definitions, concepts related to fertility and its measures 6

2.2 Theoretical framework, empirical studies related to determinants of fertility 8

2.2.1 Theoretical framework 8

• 2.2.1.1 Household demand model 12

2.2.1.2 Demand- supply framework 16

2.2.2 Empirical studies related to effects of women's education on fertility 20

2.3 Summary 25

CHAPTER THREE: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 26

3.1 Structure of the VDHS 2002 26

3.2 Data set 27

3.3 Model specification 28

3.4 Description of variables in the model 29

3.4.1 Dependent variable 29

3.4.2 Independent variables 29

3.5 Estimation strategy 34

3.5.1 Poisson regression model (PRM) 35

3.5.2 Factor change in E(yJx) 36

3.5.3 Percent change in E(yJx) 37

3.6 Chapter summary 3 7 CHAPTER FOUR: SOCIOECONOMIC CONTEXT AND PROFILES OF WOMEN'S FERTILITY 39

4.1 Geography and economy 39

4.2 Population and family planning policies and programs 41

4.2.1 Population 41

4.2.2 Family Planning Policies and Programs 43

4.3 General characteristics of women's fertility 44

4.4 Differentials in education level of women 46

4.5 Family planning message 47

4.6 Children ever born 48

4 7 Chapter summary 49

" CHAPTER FIVE: FACTORS AFFECT WOMEN'S FERTILITY IN VIETNAM 50

5.1 Empirical model 50

5.2 Estimation results 50

5.3 Summary 55

CHAPTER SIX: CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS 56

6.1 Conclusions 56 6.2 Recommendations 57 6.3 Further Research 58

REFERENCES

APPENDIX

LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES

Table 2.1: Narratives on the determinants offertility 9 Table 2.2: Intervening variables in Cochrane's model on education and fertility 19

Table 4.1: Basic demographic indicators .42

Table 4.2: Distribution of ever-married women by background characteristics

(%), Vietnam 2002 45

Table 4.3: Level of education of ever-married women, Vietnam 2002 (%) .46

Table 4.4: Exposure to family planning messages on radio and television (%) .47

Table 4.5: Children ever born by ever-married women aged 15-49, classified by

place of residence and education level .48

Table 5.1: Poisson Regression Results- Fertility model 63

Figure 2.1: Key variables and interrelations in a variant of Easterlin 's supply

-demand model 19

Age-specific fertility rate

Crude birth rate

Children ever born

General Fertility rate

General Statistical Office

Poisson regression model

Total fertility rate

U.S Agency for International Development

Vietnam Demographic and Health Survey

ABSTRACT

There are numerous studies indicate that women's education plays an important role in number of children ever born This thesis aims to explore the effect of women's education on fertility in Vietnam by using the 2002 Vietnam Demographic and Health Survey Given the characteristics of observed fertility pattern, the study applied a count data model, namely, Poisson regression to examine the effects of women's education and other determinants on fertility

The major finding of the study is that women's education poses a strong effect to reduce children born in Vietnam The higher the educated women, the lower the expected number of children Similarly, education level of husband or partners also influence the change in the number of children Other determinants of importance in the study show that the higher the age and age of giving first birth, the lower the number of children ever born Public program and knowledge such as

of ovulatory cycle and family planning positively help reducing fertility Women live in the rural areas still have a higher number of children than that of women in the urban areas

Recommendation for public policies and women health governance in Vietnam should focus more on the education for low-educated women, improving related knowledge of family planning, especially in the rural areas

1.1 Problem Statement

CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION

Population growth and socioeconomic development are an important issue to Vietnamese policy makers and development planners Vietnam has clearly made significant progress in slowing its rapidly population growth The decline in fertility has been one of the most important demographic changes in recent years The key element behind the change in population in Vietnam is considered as a result at fertility level Many policies to reduce population growth received increasing attention of the government and efforts to extend coverage of birth control services

In January 1993, the Communist Party Central Committee for the first time approved a resolution on population and family planning The resolution proposed the objective of "applying small-sized family," and recommended that "each family should have one or two children" in order to lower fertility and stabilize population

At the micro level, high population growth leads to a more serious issue of poverty Poorer families, especially women bear the burden of a large number of children with fewer resources per child, further adding to the spiral of poverty Low levels of income among the poorer families with many children leads to inadequate food availability, which perpetuates malnutrition, which in tum accelerates high levels of infant mortality Studies by Ernst and Angst (1983), King (1985) have widely reviewed the relationship between family size, education and the health of children Among poorer families, beyond a certain family size, additional children

are usually associated with lower average educational attainment and reduced levels

of child health as measured by nutritional status, and mortality

Moreover, research findings from a number of studies on fertility in Vietnam showed that women's education has a negative influence on fertility For example, Nguyen (2001) found that women's education was an important factor helped to reduce the number of children born in Vietnam In addition, a wide range of empirical studies showed that raising level of education especially for women had important effect on fertility In their research in Sub-Sahara and Latin America, Jejeebhoy (1995) and Martin (1995) showed that the inverse relationship between education and fertility can be enhanced only after relatively high levels of education have been attained

Although many scholars found that education has a negative effect on fertility, there are still certain limitations in term of estimation Analysts employed statistical estimation techniques such as linear (Ordinary least squares- OLS) that are unsuitable for fertility data, which are based on counts (Long, 1997)

This paper examines the relationship between female schooling and fertility

in Vietnam through data from Vietnam Demographic and Health Survey 2002 (VDHS 2002), focusing on Vietnamese ever-married women aged from 15-49 years old Findings from the study is expected to be used in monitoring the achievements

of the government's population policies and programs in the years to come

The main research hypothesis concerning women's reproductive behavior to

be addressed is that fertility is significantly influenced by women's education attainment

1.5 Research Methodology

Data from Vietnam Demographic and Health Survey 2002 (VDHS2002)1 is mainly used in this thesis DHS funded by the U.S Agency for International Development (USAID)-is a worldwide comprehensive survey on demographic, health and fertility indicators The VDHS 2002 was carried out in the framework of the activities of the Population and Family Health Project of the Committee for Population, Family and Children (previously the National Committee for Population and Family Planning) The VDHS 2002 was conducted by the General Statistical

1

Datasets and full explanation are available online from www.measuredhs.com

i

Office (GSO) on behalf of the Population and Family Health Project of the Committee of Population, Family and Children Based on data set of VDHS2002, a model used in the analysis is the Poisson regression that estimates the likelihood that increasing women's schooling levels lower fertility in Vietnam

1.6 Structure of the thesis

The thesis is organized in six chapters as follows:

Chapter one: Introduction The chapter introduces the research problem, research objectives, questions, hypothesis, and brief research methodology of the thesis

Chapter two: Literature review This chapter begins with the definitions and concepts of terms related to fertility Then, theoretical framework and empirical studies are reviewed

Chapter three: Research methodology The chapter presents source of data, sub-data set for the study, explanation of the relevant variables and estimation strategy

Chapter four: Socioeconomic context and respondent's profiles It presents the characteristics of respondent and the background of fertility in Vietnam based

on VDHS2002 data In addition, it also provides descriptive statistics of fertility

Chapter five: Factors affect women's fertility in Vietnam The results of regression analysis, interpretation of coefficients and their marginal effects to fertility are shown

Chapter six: Conclusions and recommendations This chapter is to summarize the findings and conclude with some policy recommendations and research limitation

CHAPTER TWO

LITERATURE REVIEW

The objective of the study is to examine the effect of women's education on fertility Therefore, the definitions and concepts related to fertility, their measurements and determinants will be defined After that theoretical framework and empirical studies are also reviewed The final section is to summarize of the main point of literature review presented in the chapter

2.1 Definitions, concepts related to fertility and its measures

In the jargon of demographers, there are two terms which are often used synonymously; in fact they are different from each other Fertility refers to a number of children born to women In the Multilingual Demographic Dictionary of the United Nations, fertility means the actual reproductive performance of women, whereas fecundity denotes the physical ability to reproduce

Some measures of fertility are cited in Tran (2001: 60), Nguyen (2001:7), VDHS 2002, as follows:

The most common measurement of fertility is the Total Fertility Rate (TFR) The TFR is the average number of children that would be born to a woman during her lifetime if she was to bear children at each age according to the prevailing age-specific fertility rates The TFR is obtained by summing the age-specific rates in a particular calendar year across all childbearing ages Therefore, the TFR shows a cross sectional picture of fertility and consists of values from

many generations of women who are at different childbearing stages in any given year It is unaffected by the age and sex composition of the population and thus separate change in actual fertility It supposes that women don't die during the reproductive age, so it isn't influenced by mortality

An alternative measure of fertility is the Generational Fertility Rate The general fertility rate (GFR) which represents the annual number of births per 1,000 women in reproductive ages (15-49) Therefore it represents the actual number of births that a particular cohort of women experienced over their reproductive lifetime It is affected by the age distribution of women in childbearing age

The crude birth rate (CBR) which represents the annual number of births per 1,000 population The CBR was estimated using the birth history data in conjunction with the population data collected in the household schedule It is influenced by time and space, depending on many factors such as intensity of reproductive process, age and sex structure of population Consequently, CBR is just an indicator that approximately reflects the actual fertility rate

Age-specific fertility rates (ASFR) are calculated by dividing the number of births to women in a specific age group by the number of woman-years lived during

a given period2 • Age-specific fertility rates are useful in understanding the age

2

Numerators for the age-specific fertility rates were obtained by classifying births during the 5-year period prior to the survey into standard five-year age groups, according to the mother's age at the time of birth and summing Den~minators fo.r the r~tes were the numbe~ of person-years lived by all women in each five~ year age group dunng the penod Smce only ever-rnamed women were interviewed in the VDHS, it was

pattern of fertility In an ever-married sample of women such as in the VDHS, the

calculation of all-women fertility rates makes the implicit assumption that no births occurred among women who have never married

Children ever born (CEB) are the average number of live births that

women has had during her lifetime It is derived from data gathered by censuses or

surveys

Different from the macro measures of fertility mentioned above, which refer

to fertility of population, CEB is a micro measure covering individuals or household As a micro indicator, CEB is often employed in studies of micro

fertility behavior because of its simplicity for collecting data

2.2 Theoretical framework, empirical studies related to determinants of fertility

2.2.1 Theoretical framework

Van de Kaa (1996) organizes the literature on fertility written in the second half of the twentieth century and classifies them according to their main "narrative",

that means what story a piece of demographic literature is talking about His work

provides a convenient and clear picture of the different schools of thought reflected

necessary to inflate the number of person-years lived by ever-married women by factors representing the proportion of women who were ever-married in each age group These factors were calculated from the data collected in the household schedule Never-married women were presumed not to have given birth In Vietnam, few births occur outside of marriage so that any underestimation of fertility from this source is negligible

in various researches on fertility Table 2.1 shows a summary of the different narratives and their specific themes

• Table 2.1: Narratives on the determinants of fertility

Classical: Initial Narrative Explanations for "what people all know about the

way things go in this world"

• Social progress and desire for mobility

• Increasing rationalization of behavior

• Modernization process and the demographic transition theory

Proximate determinants and mortality decline Biological and Technological

• Fecundability of a woman

• Concept of natural fertility

• Eleven intermediate fertility variables which affect the exposure to the risk of conception

• Exposure factors, deliberate marital control and

natural marital control

• Falling infant and child mortality

• Consumer choice demand for children theory

• Demand-supply oriented, combining biological

Social

Innovation, Diffusion, and

Ideational and Cultural

Change

Path-Dependency and

Institutional Change

and sociological elements, and later fertility

regulation and cost

Changing function of the family and the value of

children

• Pre-transitional societies favored early marriage

and high fertility

• Social conditions determining intergenerational

wealth flow

• Macro-analytic framework that includes the

socio-cultural context, education, occupation and

location

• Non-economic value of children: Social and

psychological

Innovation and diffusion of ideas and practices

• Spread of the practice of fertility regulation

• Effects of changes in value systems

Fertility variables and determinants being

influenced by clusters of behavioral rules

• Path-dependent behavioral rules

• Institutional determinants

Source ofbasic data: Van de Kaa (1996)

At least six themes have been identified, namely, the classical narratives revolving around the initial explanations of demographic changes, the biological and technological narratives on the proximate determinants of fertility, the economic narratives using microeconomic theories, the social narratives about the family and society, the narratives on innovation and diffusion of ideas and practices and the narratives of path-dependency behavior and institutional changes

The narratives involving economic models on fertility are largely microeconomic in approach The two main groups of studies include demand-oriented consumer choice theories and the demand-supply analytical framework One usual argument in economic models uses the concept of opportunity cost of childcare to argue that there is a negative relationship between parental education and fertility: more educated parents, who are usually working parents, give up some income-earning opportunities when they devote more time to childcare, so they would rather have fewer children If such behavior indeed happens, this is the so-called dominant substitution effect It may further be said that the income earned from devoting more time working can be used to provide for better quality childcare

to fewer children An alternative picture is that a positive relationship between education and fertility is also possible This is the case of a dominant income effect, wherein the more educated and presumably working parents will be earning an income enough to afford raising more children Which of these scenarios apply to a given society depends on empirical testing

2.2.1.1 Household demand model

The theoretical framework for modeling fertility has mainly exposed by

Becker He argued that fertility is determined by the interaction between quantity and quality of children, which are separate argument in the utility function The

quality - quantity approach developed by Becker (1960) and Becker and Lewis

(1973) emphasizes that there is likely a substitution effect from quantity to quality

of children with rising family income The key feature in Becker analysis is that the shadow prices of children with respect to their number (the cost of an additional

child, holding their quality constant) is greater the higher their quality is Similarly,

the shadow price of children with respect to their quality (the cost of a unit increase

in quality, holding number constant) is greater, the greater the number of children

To illustrate this reasoning, the following simple utility function was specified:

U =u (n, q, y) (1)

Where n is the number of children, q is their quality and y IS the rate of consumption of all other commodities The budget constraint is

I =nq1r +yzy (2)

I is the full income, 7r is the price of nq and 1r)' is the price of y The first order

conditions optimization are:

Un = Aq7r =f.pn Uq= Amr=f.pq Uy=Azy=f.py (3)

The important point is that the shadow price of children respect to number

(pn) is positively related to q, the level of quality, and the shadow price with respect

to quality (pq) is positively related to n, the number children Quality has a major effect on the resource constraint because the cost of an additional child depends on

its quality, while the full cost of higher quality children depends on their number

The economic interpretation is that an increase in quality is more expensive if there

are more children because the increase has to apply to more units Similarly, an

increase in quantity is more expensive if the children are of higher quality, because higher quality children cost more A simple modification of constraint in (2) is:

R= npn+qpq+ypy= I+nq?r (4)

The interaction between the quantity and quality of children in the non-linear budget equation and also in the utility function has several paradoxical implications

on fertility Explicitly a rise in income could reduce the demand for children if

higher income greatly increases the education and other training of children The

reason is that higher expenditures on training increase the variable cost of children,

and could dominate the increased demand due to the income effect (Becker 1960,

Willis 1973, Becker and Lewis 1973) An increase in quality per child implies an

increase in costs raising a child, which decreases fertility For more technical details

see Becker and Lewis 1973 The improvement of the women human capital level

following a high achievement enrollment, increase the time cost and notably the

price of the service offered to bearing and rearing children Henceforth, the burden

of raising child increase and so the desire to have an additional child decreaseso

Beside that, the rise of the mother's time value encourages her to participate

intensively in the labor market This improvement of the well being empowers her

to actively participate in the decision making within the family in favor of fertility decrease, Schultz (1990) The fertility is determined by female wage and family

income, which are assumed to measure the time cost of raising children and earning

potential Increases in the value of female time by female wage increase tend to

increase the children cost A negative effect on fertility is so expected since the

opportunity cost of having children increases Therefore, fertility decision is taken

in putting in balance the advantage and cost of an additional birth The increase in the wife's wage enhances of course the family income but it will also increase the

opportunity cost of child bearing and rearing The change of women's wage and family income present two fold an income and a price effect The effect of change is

depending of the magnitude of setting income and substitution effects Becker

argues that the substitution effect would be larger than the income effect, referring

to his assumption that the income elasticity of demand for child quality is larger

then the income elasticity of demand for child quantity Henceforth, higher family income would lead fewer children and high quality per child The net effect of

income on fertility depends on the relative strength of the income effect to the

substitution effect Also, an asymmetric effect on fertility can be observed with a

positive wage's change resulting by an improvement of the level of the men's

human capital or by the rise of his market wage rate that increases the family's

income Improvement of human capital and the education development provides to

woman as man a multiple choice on their lifestyle and the autonomy in the marital timing decision Education development lets woman to delays her marriage age Hence educated woman doesn't use the total fertility period and so has few children

in comparison to the less educated one

Becker's work belongs to the so-called economic sub-discipline of household

or new home economics, which uses the household production concept Household economic modeling was used as early as 1957 by Leibenstein and in the later years has found its way into various aspects of family life Van de Kaa ( 1996) considers the common features of the new home economics studies to include the use of a time constraint especially for women, the household stock of human and physical capital, and the lifecycle conditions influencing labor market training, migration, marriage, children and retirement savings

In addition, a prominent approach, which is associated with the "New Household Economics," begins from the proposition that members of the household unit seek to maximize income In this formulation, it is assumed that women and men respond to economic incentive structures Accordingly, the theory predicts that once education is provided as a public good and becomes widespread for women and men, an increase in education leads to a decline in fertility, all things being equal The putative mechanism for this effect is the opportunity costs associated with caring for children as education increases As women acquire skill sets useful

in the marketplace with higher levels of educational attainment, they tend to command a higher wage, increasing the value of their time To the degree that

education raises women's and men's earning potential in the labor market, the theory also implies that education reduces the incentive to attempt to use fertility as

a mechanism to increase family production and income While recognizing the micro-economic influences of education, complementary approaches suggest that the link between education and fertility is more complex A theoretically eclectic framework developed by Castro Martin and Juarez hypothesizes that education may depress fertility rates for a number of reasons, including improved literacy and cognitive skills that increase the likelihood of interaction between women and public health institutions; improved knowledge of the biology of reproduction (which raises the potential efficacy of contraceptive use); and changes in attitudes that that raise the likelihood of using contraceptives

2.2.1.2 Demand - supply framework

Van de Kaa (1996, p 410) highlights the following important findings in the demand-oriented models: there is a strong interaction between the quantity and quality of children although the two are not close substitutes, and the demand for children is highly responsive to their price This means that parents often consider the kind of life they can offer to their children when they make decisions about family size, and this includes the costs of childcare But Van de Kaa also exposes a potential weakness in this model, i.e., it may be hard to apply to less developed countries because time may not be a real constraint to numerous low-income households

Later recognizing that the demand-oriented model obviously focused only on one side of the story and did not dwell on the supply side, economists like Easterlin (1975) started to pursue a demand-supply framework on fertility Nevertheless Easterlin (1975, p 54) commended the important contributions of the household production model He cited that: The model clarifies the concept of full income for analyzing fertility decisions; reduces the conceptual confusion between cost of children and expenditures per child and that rising incomes may even increase the demand for both quantity and quality of children; and explicitly recognizes both the competition between children and economic goods for parental time and the value

of that time to each parent In the basic model of Easterlin (1975, p-57), the determinants of fertility work through three main variables- demand and supply

of children and the costs of fertility regulation - and their immediate determinants These main determinants in relation with regulation cost are explained in detail as follows:

(a) The demand for children (Cd) if fertility regulation were costless: The determinants are income, price of children and the subjective preference for children relative to other goods;

(b) The potential supply of children (Cn) if no conscious effort were made to control

fertility: The determinants are natural fertility and the survival prospects of a baby

to adulthood; and

(c) The cost of fertility regulation: Fertility regulation, in this case, refers to the

individual's desire or action to control the factors affecting childbirth The determinants are the attitudes and the time and money needed to learn and use the techniques of regulation

The motivation for regulating fertility is jointly determined by the supply and

demand for children If there is an excess demand situation, there is no need to use

fertility regulation even if knowledge is available Whereas, if there is an excess

supply situation, which implies the presence of unwanted children, there is an incentive to use fertility regulation Actual use depends on how the cost compares

with the motivation These costs are affected by attitudes and access to fertility

regulation techniques Accessing fertility regulation techniques, in tum, involves the availability of methods and the information on these, and their prices

A fuller specification of the theoretical model was developed in Easterlin and Crimmins (as cited in Van de Kaa, 1996, p 412) It considers modernization factors

such as education and urbanization, cultural and genetic factors, as well as the

proximate determinants-those that very closely affect fertility like nuptiality,

contra~eption and infecundability Easterlin also suggests that increases in

education and urbanization may raise natural fertility, and therefore, affect the

supply side, as these improve health and break down traditional cultural practiceso

Bongaarts developed an alternative implementation of Easterlin's model to

make it empirically feasible to apply His variant introduces a new variable, the

degree of preference implementation, through which the costs and benefits of

fertility regulation are reflected (Bongaarts 1993) This is shown in Figure 2.1

Figure 2.1: Key variables and interrelations in a variant of Easterlin's

supply-demand model

Cost of fertility

regulation

Supply of births (Natural fertility, Fn \

- - - - - - - ,

Demand for births Fertility, F -(_w_a_n_te_d_£-ert-i-li-ty_,_F_w_) - I

Also using the demand-supply framework, Cochrane (1979, pp 53-55)

specifically focused on the indirect effects of parental education on fertility, i.e., where the effect of education works through intervening variables These variables

include eight supply factors, seven demand factors and five fertility regulation

factors But, as she herself admitted, the model's weakness is that it covers a broad

range of variables and interactions that make it difficult to develop a mathematically

structured model

Table 2.2 Intervening variables in Cochrane's model on education and fertility

Demand variables Supply variables Fertility regulation

variables Preferences for children Probability of being married Husband's marital power

Husband's wage Wife's age at marriage Husband-wife

Wife's wage Separate location of spouse Knowledge ofbirth

Incompatibility of wife's Joint family living control

Economic benefits of Taboos on sexual activity Access to birth control

The model focuses on the decision to have another child, rather than on the

total demand for children, and how this decision is determined by demand and supply factors as well as regulation factors The model also explicitly incorporates

the separate preferences of husbands and wives and their interactions

In Cochrane's (1979, pp.75-77) analysis, education may have both positive

and negative effects on fertility on the supply side, but on the demand side the effect

seems to be more negative On fertility regulation, education increases the

knowledge and practice of fertility regulation-including increased communication

between husbands and wives about the matter, therefore, affects fertility negatively

2.2.2 Empirical studies related to effects of women's education on fertility

There are a number of studies focused the determinants of fertility m

Vietnam and other countries In Vietnam, many researchers used the secondary data

from VHLSS or VDHS to analyze fertility determinants via descriptive statistics method Nguyen (2001) with data from VHLSS 1997-1998 explored socioeconomic determinants of fertility in Vietnam The study investigated the effects of factors including women's age, schooling, occupation, religion, area of residence, marital status, household income, and infrastructure condition on fertility Similarly, Shapiro (1996) who also observed the relationship between fertility and women's employment, education and family planning in Vietnam through data from VDHS

1998 and Population census in 1999 The research ofNguyen-Dinh (1997) using a microeconomic model, a demand-supply framework, on the 1988 Vietnam Demographic and Health Survey, which covered 4,172 ever-married women in their childbearing ages, 15-49, to study the socioeconomic determinants of fertility Two important results relevant to the current research are (I) that paternal education significantly lowers household fertility levels in Vietnam and (2) this negative effect

of education is not based on the opportunity cost, but on attitudinal and/or information effects that influence preferences for children Beside socioeconomic

determinants, Le et al (1999) used data in the period 1993-1998 to analyze

proximate determinants of fertility in Vietnam such as age of marriage, contraceptive use, abortion and infecundability etc

Ainsworth (1989) used the model of demand for children of Becker and OLS technique to find out the effect of women's education and household income on fertility in Cote d'Ivoire Cochrane (1979) argues that earlier economists such as Malthus and his successors have proposed theories about why more education is

inversely related to fertility However, the relationship between education and fertility is more complex than suggested Though the underlying pattern most commonly known shows a negative relationship, there are instances where positive relationships at very low and very high levels of schooling have been found Bledsoe et al (1999) suggested that understanding the nature and strength of the

relationship between education and fertility remains a central challenge both for researchers seeking to explain demographic and social changes and for policy makers who must decide on the allocation of scarce public resources According to Martin and Juarez (1995, pp 53), education is a "source" of knowledge transmission, "vehicle" of socioeconomic advancement, and a "transformer" of attitudes In the contemporary world, any development depends on the effective transmission of new information As a source of knowledge transmission, Martin and Juarez showed that schooling imparts literacy skills, which enable people to process a wide range of information and arouse cognitive change that shape individuals interaction with their surrounding environment As a vehicle of socioeconomic development, the authors hypothesized that education not only enhances cognitive abilities, but also it opens up economic opportunities and social mobility In the contemporary world, education credentials open the door for formal employment and for sorting individuals into the hierarchy of occupations

Educated women are more likely to exercise the "quality-quantity trade-off'

of their children Most of these women are likely to see the benefit of their schooling; they may develop higher aspirations for their own children's schooling

It is obvious that as the number of children increases, familial resources available to

an individual child decrease Restricting the number of children is the best solution

in order to have better educated children and more familial resources per child It

would be advantageous for a woman to have fewer children that she can afford to pay for the tuition and other related fees associated with schooling, hence the trade-off between quality and quantity of children

* Other determinants

Besides education, a large number of variables also pose effect to fertility For example, Bongaarts et a/ (1984) consider two groups of variables: socioeconomic variables and proximate variables Socioeconomic variables include education, social, cultural, economic, and health variables whereas proximate variables include biological and behavioral variables such as contraception and age

of a woman Davis and Blake (1956), Bongaarts and Potter (1983) hypothesize that

in order for the socioeconomic variables to affect fertility, they must operate through proximate determinants

Another factor is the age at first marriage Women who get married early have a longer period where the likelihood of an additional child is greater An additional reason for including age at first marriage is that this variable might partly control for a woman's "social status," since high income and highly educated individuals are likely to get married late Other fertility studies, such as Kiernan

(1989), and Santos Silva and Covas (2000) find a negative effect of a late marriage

on the probability of having children

Cultural traits such as son preference and number of siblings are important to explain fertility behavior in a traditional society such as Vietnam, therefore, they deserves to be looked in detail Khan and Khanum (2000) found that sons are generally preferred over daughters owing to a complex interplay of economic and socio-cultural factors Hank and Hans-Peter (2000) suggest that son preference is embedded in cultural and religious traditions and community norms as well as economical factors, shaping individual attitudes and behavior In most developing countries where women are economically and socially dependent on men, male offspring are presumed to have greater economic net utility than female offspring The argument is that sons can help to provide old age support to their parents This

is particularly important in most developing countries where there is no other form

of old-age security Hank and Hans-Kohler (2002) suggest that sex preferences for children might have implications for a couple's fertility behavior, where parents who desire one or more children of a certain sex should tend to have larger families than would otherwise be the case Studies by Duncan et a! (1965), Axinn et a!

(1994) have found a direct relationship between the number of children born to a family and the number of children within the couple's (husband and/or wife) family

In other words, a couple from larger families is more likely to mimic the sexual behavior of their parents hence breeding intergenerational inheritance of family

SIZe

Another important determinant of fertility decision is the contraceptive knowledge and application Access to information about and the actual use of several birth control measures and medical facilities services can be critical in slowing population growth in low-income countries The use of contraceptive may help in avoiding pregnancies for woman who want to limit her birth, to space birth

or to avoid bearing child This being so, it can be expected that differences in access

to, and/or the use of birth control will explain the fertility variations The use might differ between rural communities and urban centers Therefore variable indicating whether the couple grew up in a rural or urban area is included in explaining fertility decision

2.3 Summary

This chapter presents literature review of the theories of fertility, fertility determinants and empirical studies on fertility Fertility is measured by total number children ever born per woman is of interest in the study From literature review, a group of explanatory variables including women's education, age, knowledge of ovulatory, family planning, her partner's education, type of place of residence, age

at first birth will be examined empirically After exploring and analyzing many previous studies, the household demand approach is used as a core of fertility model

in my research and Poisson regression model The framework will be specified to apply for estimation the effects of women's education on fertility in Vietnam

CHAPTER THREE RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

This chapter deals with the methodological aspects of this study It presents the source of data, structure of VDHS 2002, model specification, variables of interest, and strategy estimation Firstly, structure of VDHS 2002 and data set are presented Secondly, the suggested model will be specified with specific variables Dependent and independent variables, their definition, expected signs also shown Then, estimation method is described in detail

3.1 Structure of the VDHS 2002

The sample unit for the VDHS 2002 was based on that used in the VDHS

1997, which in tum was a subsample of the 1996 Multi-Round Demographic Survey (MRS), a semi-annual survey of about 243,000 households undertaken regularly by GSO The MRS sample consisted of 1,590 sample areas known as enumeration areas (EAs) spread throughout the 53 provinces/cities of Vietnam, with

30 EAs in each province On average, an EA comprises about 150 households For the VDHS 1997, a subsample of205 EAs was selected, with 26 households in each urban EA and 39 households for each rural EA A total of 7,150 households were selected for the survey The VDHS 1997 was designed to provide separate estimates for the whole country, urban and rural areas, for 18 project provinces and the remaining non project provinces as well

Because the main objective of the VDHS 2002 was to measure change in reproductive health indicators over the five years since the VDHS 1997, the sample

design for the VDHS 2002 was as similar as possible to that of the VDHS 1997 Although it would have been ideal to have returned to the same households or at least the same sample points as were selected for the VDHS 1997, several factors

made this undesirable Revisiting the same households would have held the sample

artificially rigid over time and would not allow for newly formed households This would have conflicted with the other major survey objective, which was to provide

up-to-date, representative data for the whole of Vietnam Revisiting the same

sample points that were covered in 1997 was complicated by the fact that the

country had conducted a population census in 1999, which allowed for a more representative sample frame

In order to balance the two mam objectives of measuring change and providing representative data, it was decided to select enumeration areas from the

1999 Population Census, but to cover the same communes that were sampled in the

VDHS 1997 and attempt to obtain a sample point as close as possible to that

selected in 1997 Consequently, the VDHS 2002 sample also consisted of 205

sample points and reflects the over-sampling in the 20 provinces that fall in the World Bank-supported Population and Family Health Project The sample was

designed to produce about 7,000 completed household interviews and 5,665

completed interviews with ever-married women age 15-49

3.2 Data set

As stated, the data in this study is extracted from Vietnam Demographic and Health Survey 2002 of married women aged 15-49 The VDHS 2002 is a nationally representative sample survey of 5,665 ever married women age 15-49 selected from

205 sample points throughout Vietnam It was conducted by the General Statistical Office (GSO) on behalf of the Population and Family Health Project of the Committee of Population, Family and Children Fieldwork took place from October

to December 2002 The Demographic and Health Surveys division of ORC Macro

in Calverton Maryland provided technical assistance to the project through several visits and through e-mails However, due to missing values for some variables in the data set, only 5,381 observations ever married women have completed information

in the model

For our analysis, a limitation of the survey is its lack of information on household income However, as in most developing countries, such information is difficult to collect and unreliable Perhaps it is for these reasons that no questions about money income or wages were asked Instead, women were asked only if their husbands had a stable source of income as a proxy for household income

3.3 Model specification

The empirical model for analysis of fertility regresses a number of children ever born to each woman on a set of independent variables that are assumed to be exogenous to fertility decision but that influence either the demand or supply of children This reduced-form model of fertility "determinants" can be written as: