Bangladesh 1993-1994 Demographic and Health ... - Measure DHS

Figure 2.1Population Pyramid, Bangladesh, 1993-9480+75-7970-7465-6960-6455-5950-5445-4940-4435-3930.3425-2920-2415-1910-145-90-4Male ~ Femalei I p10 5 0 5 tOPercentBDHS lg93-94with one exception. There is a a smaller proportion of children under age five than age 5 to 9, which confirmsrecent declines in fertility (see Figure 2.1).Urban areas have relatively fewer people under age 15 than rural areas (39 vs. 43 percent). Also, theshift to lower proportions of total population begins at age group 5-9 in urban areas, instead of at age group0-4 as in rural areas. These differences support the supposition that fertility declines in Bangladesh, as inmany other countries, began with the urban population.The sex ratio, the number of males per 100 females, is 105 for the age group 0-4 years, while it isabout 101 for ages 5-14 years. However, there is an excess of females over males at ages 15-29, followedby a reversal at ages 30-49 years; the pattem is repeated between the age ranges 50-64 years and 65 years andabove. The 1991 BCPS documented a similar age-sex structure for the household population (Mitra et al.,1993). Migration of young men to other countries for work most likely contributes to the low sex ratios atages 15-29. Overreporting of ages of men and/or underreporting of ages of women may also be an underlyingcause of the observed irregular age-sex structure.The irregular bulge of women at ages 50-54 years suggests that, in addition to possible heaping onage 50, women may have been pushed from age 45-49 to 50-54, perhaps to reduce the workload of theinterviewer. This pattern has been observed in other DHS surveys (Rutstein and Bicego, 1990). The patternis more pronounced among women in rural than in urban areas. The impact of these irregularities on thequality of the data is probably small, since there are relatively few women at these ages.Figure 2.2 presents the distribution of the male and female household population by single year ofage (see also Appendix Table C.I). The data show evidence of a preference for reporting ages that end inzero or five (age "heaping" or digit preference) that is common in countries where ages are not well known.10