Small Family, Happy Family? Fertility Preferences and the Quantity-Quality Trade-off in Sub-Saharan Africa

To attenuate the adverse effects of high population growth in low-income countries and to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals, knowledge on rural fertility preferences and the existence of a quantity-quality trade-off between the number of children and child-raising quality is key. To tackle this, we implement a choice experiment in Senegal and Uganda. We include three quality and one quantity aspect of child-raising, and three socio-economic drivers of fertility, resulting in a comprehensive assessment. We show that rural households prefer to have many children, but women and non-poor respondents demonstrate a lower preference for many children than men and poor respondents. We find that the quantity-quality trade-off is a two-sided story. On the one hand, for most of the quality attributes, we confirm the existence of a trade-off. On the other hand, quantity and quality are complementary when all children in the household can attain a lower secondary school diploma. Our results imply that broadening the currently narrow focus on contraceptive uptake in family planning programs, and more specific targeting of such programs to people with low fertility preferences, could improve their effectiveness. JEL codes J10, J13, J19