Predicting Cohort Fertility in a Traditional Urban Centre: An Example from Ilorin, Nigeria.
Dr. Olawepo, R.A.; Obayelu, H.I.

Abstract
This paper presents a model for predicting cohort fertility in a traditional urban community in Ilorin, Nigeria with a view to assessing those factors that are important determinants, given the existing scenario in the unique urban centre. A simple random technique was used to administer 800 questionnaires among the three cohorts of 1970s, 80s and 90s.The study revealed that while the mean number of birth intervals and mean length of birth intervals are decreasing with women’s age by cohort, the effect is an increasing fertility level and consequent high population growth in this traditional urban community. This showed that a large proportion of women here still have their first births at prime ages. By giving birth early and presumably with short birth intervals, these women and their children are at a high risk of mortality, given the poor state of health and nutrition available to them. The stepwise multiple regressions show that in all ten cases, five variables were found to be significant at the specified level of 0.05 % entry into the model. These are economic status and income level, age at first birth, migrant status of husbands, accessibility to family planning/health care, education level of husbands. Appropriate recommendations were made accordingly to improve the levels of responsible parenthood overtime.

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