Economics, geography, family planning and rapidity of change in the demographic transition: the case of the Egyptian muhafazas 1960-1996

The Egyptian demographic transition from 1960 to 1996 is analyzed at the Muhafaza level. A reconstruction of demographic patterns highlights variation in the under-recording of infants across time, space, and rural/urban status. The quality of registration is worse for girls, producing an abnormal sex ratio that also varies across space and time. The analysis of fertility shows that the fertility upsurge of 1974-85 was not spatially uniform. Multi-level regression shows that fertility fluctuations are associated with the distribution of women's time between work and family, women's education, mortality decline, population density, and men's migration. After accounting for these variables and family planning, there remains a north-south gradient which wanes over the period, and a time factor interpretable as the rapidity of change and responsible for a brief fertility increase during the opening phase of the transition.