Africa family systems in the context of socio-economic change

Distr.: LIMITED POP/APC.3/92/Inf.5

17 September 1992

UNITED NATIONS

Original: ENGLISH

ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL COUNCIL

ECONOMIC COMMISSION FOR AFRICA Third African Population Conference

Meeting of Experts Dakar, Senegal

7-10 December 1992

AFRICA FAMILY SYSTEMS IN THE CONTEXT OF SOCIO-ECONOMIC CHANGE

This paper was prepared by Dr. Christine Oppong and is reproduced without formal editing. It is intended to provide participants background information for the discussion of item 5 of the provisional agenda. The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the United Nations.

The designation employed and the presentation of the material in this publication do not imply the expression

of any opinion whatever on the part of the Secretariat of the United Nations concerning the legal status of any

country, territory, city or area, or of its authorities, or concerning of its frontiers or boundaries.

POP/APC.3/92/Inf.5

CONTENTS

Page

SUMMARY u

INTRODUCTION *

The economic crisis *

The demographic facts 2

Population policies 3

Economic policy-making 4

FAMILY SOLIDARITY: CRISIS AND CHANGE 4

Parental control ^

Impacts of social and spatial mobility »

THE ECONOMIC BASE: FAMILY SURVIVAL 7

Family firms ^

Unemployment and underemployment 9

Insecurity and poverty 9

The informal sector 9

Training |0

Women's deprivations **

Women's time and energy crisis 12

YOUTH: PRODUCTIVE AND REPRODUCTIVE ROLE

TRANSITIONS }*

Traditional socialization |5

Schooling J°

Sexual relations j«

Youth programmes 17

MARRUGE J7

Age at marriage J°

Types of union **

Women alone 21

Sexuality and disease transmission 21

PARENTHOOD 23

Child labour 24

Maternal costs and control 25

Fostering 28

Paternal responsibilities 29

Demographic and contraceptive innovation 31

CONSEQUENCES 33

LIST OF TABLES

Table 1: Africa in the late 1980s: Orders of magnitude

Table 2: Proportion of women in modem sectors of Third World working in socially

embedded enterprises: Regional averages

Table 3: Proportion of women in modem sectors of Third World working in socially

embedded enterprises: Country averages

Table 4: Urban and rural youth population, world and regions, 1970-2000

Table 5: Distribution of countries according to percentage of women ever married

15-19, Africa, 1945-1985

Table 6: Singulate mean age at marriage of women, by selected levels of education,

various countries of Africa (Years)

POP/APC.3/92/Inf.5 SUMMARY

This paper focuses upon the ability of African families to raise and educate their young in contexts of increasing poverty and deprivation and escalating political tensions, as populations double in the space of two decades and millions migrate from their homes pursuing various survival strategies. Indications are given of the various responses of family members to diverse situations: on the one hand personal access to modern resources and on the other poverty and challenging crisis.

The discussion is meant to raise questions regarding the kinds of economic and

demographic policy options open to governments faced with rising aspirations and needs of

their people both parents and the young. A focus of concern is the changing roles of women as parents, workers, spouses and kin as they strive to combine a range of often conflicting activities and responsibilities in contexts of frequently diminishing resources and support available from kin, spouses and communities.

This focus on gender roles at the micro-level illustrates the linkages between economic and demographic processes and serves to highlight the importance of making macro-population and development policies both more gender sensitive and more relevant to the economic and demographic aspirations and realities faced by African families at the present time.

Gender inequalities are viewed as seriously implicated in the failure of both families and nation states to attain their economic and demographic goals.

Attention is incidentally called to the need for more relevant and realistic multi- disciplinary evidence on which to base decision-making, policy formulation and programme design at the local and national level. Familial roles and relations, the locus of both productive and reproductive processes require more attention in this regard. This will entail serious attempts to rectify the omissions and neglect of the past by researchers, data collectors and analysts, as well as by planners and policy-makers.

INTRODUCTION

During the past three decades the majority of sub-Saharan African countries have witnessed simultaneously rapid increases and therefore growing youthfulness, as well as spatial mobility and dislocation of their populations. There has been a marked shift of people from rural to rapidly growing urban conglomerations. These demographic changes have occurred within a context of economic stagnation, recurrent crises, spiralling debt burdens and the introductionf > .subject to international pressure and support - of Structural Adjustment Programmes. ■ ' .

Economic crisis . , . : ' .

During the past decade the servicing of debt-burdens has become increasingly crippling for many countries. This has led to disruption of development programmes with serious social and political consequences. Moreover therperiod has seen the dwindling of external resource flows available for development and the increase of cases in which the outflow of debt service payments is larger than the inflows of external capital. The context is one of unfavourable terms of international trade, high interest rates and imported inflation.

While in the sixties there was a stress.upon growth oriented strategies, with emphasis upon increasing national income through developing the modern sector of the economy, issues of employment and equity were mainly neglected, with serious consequences for unemployment, underemployment'and poverty in the seventies. Urban bias resulted in agricultural, neglect and decline and questions relating to human resource development and resource allocation were scarcely considered. In addition relatively high standards of GNP growth, were not paralleled by the improvement of mass living standards. This led the International Labour Organization to draw international attention to the inability of the growth oriented approach to1 promote the needed levels of productive employment

opportunities (Lisk, in press). ...:.. .; '

In the decade of the seventies poverty alleviation became the prime goal for many governments, but the remedies applied were found to be less than successful, as they did not confront the basic problems of structural change. The outcome has been that economic planning has had to be reduced'to crisis management, associated with Structural Adjustment Programmes which have diverted the attention of decision-makers and planners away from the long term development issues (ibid.). - \ . , .

i ,■ ' \ •, * -I

-■ The in-built gender biases of these. Structural Adjustment Policies in the region have been highlighted by a number of people, among them Diana Elson (1987), who noted that structural adjustment policies have reallocated resources to the detriment of women by taking no note of their reproductive and socializing'roles. It is considered that these will continue whatever happens. Because of this sex biased neglect "the success of macro-economic policy in reaching its goals may be won at the cost of a longer and harder working day for women.

This cost will be invisible to the macro-economic policy-makers in statistics in the health and nutritional status of such women" (p. 3) and we should add - their children. For adjustment policies have put women out of paid work and cut down the social programmes of health and social welfare. Accordingly they have less money and time to care for their families and all have suffered. Living standards and nutrition have been decreasing across the board. The net result of such economic policies has been that total incomes are now being devoted to food and fuel to cook it. Chronic malnutrition rates of children have become high providing stark evidence of the harsh impacts of the policies. It has been argued that the subsequent programmes to alleviate the effects of these draconian policies have only treated women as victims rather than taking into account their very real contributions.

POP/PAC.3/92/Inf.5 Page 2

In spite of whatever efforts that have been made to the contrary, the employment crisis has deepened during the decade of the eighties leading to increasing unemployment and underemployment associated with declining incomes and a general increase in the incidence of poverty. Moreover, the employment problem is recognized as falling disproportionately on the young and women (OAU, 1991b).

Among the employment policies being promoted by African states, in addition to exploring faster expansion of the urban formal sector, are expansion of employment in the rural agro and cottage industries and an intensified effort to increase productivity and incomes in the urban informal sector. Of great concern is the unemployment of the most energetic section of the population, the youth that is young men, for young women for the most part are over involved in productive and reproductive work. There is thus emphasis upon the gearing of education and training policies towards promotion of self-employment and we assume family-based micro-enterprises.

The demographic facts

For several decades and still today the demographic facts which have fashioned population profiles in the region are the persistent high mortality and fertility and the widespread mobile search for means for survival, if.not employment, in increasingly harsh economic and ecological environments. This has included labour migration of women and men and children, as well as the dislocation of increasingly large populations of refugees fleeing regions stricken by drought and internecine warfare (Adepoju, 1990 and in press).

Thus the regional economic crisis is occurring within a context of rapid population growth rates, uneven population distribution, rapid urbanization and massive and escalating unemployment and pauperization. The gaps between rich and poor are increasing, in spite of national social and economic development programmes and projects. The proportions of populations and the numbers of people malnourished are growing. In some countries by now the majority of the population are classified as food poor, unable to obtain the basic daily allowance of nutrients required for optimum needs.1

By 1995 the regions population is estimated to reach 650 million and annual growth rates remain high around 3.0 per cent, with average family sizes around six children per woman and continuing high rates of maternal and infant mortality and poor health conditions.

The economic problems are compounded by high rates of rural urban migration of job seekers and well as populations suffering .drought and desertification and political

catastrophes. .. . .. ■ •

The continuing high fertility is recognized to be the result of a combination of socio- cultural and economic factors. These include very early marriage for girls; erosion of traditional long breast-feeding periods and post-partum sexual abstinence in addition to limited use of modern contraception. The position of women relative to men in society is

admitted to be unequal legally, economically and socially.2 Moreover there is recognized

still to be a relative lack of clear population policies in many countries (UNECA, 1990).

In view of the comparative youthfulness of populations dependency burdens are high, affecting overall economic performance, consumption patterns, capital formation, indebtedness and the quality of the labour force as well as the household composition and needs. In view of the labour intensive nature of most work, including subsistence labour and the lack of mechanization and infrastructure, there is a heavy dependence upon child labour,

Page 3 affecting the levels of schooling and training achieved by the young, in particular girls, who are especially deprived since they enter early the double burdens of productive and

reproductive activities. :: ' • ■-"""-' •''

The demograptiic*evidehce on the African family "-is limited to statistics on marriage and child bearing and the size and composition of residential groups (Locoh, 1988). Even then there is increasing recognition' that the classification of marital status is often crude in the extreme; not' reflecting the sophistication; diversity and change of actual conjugal relationships in the region. Moreover, residential status also cannot be taken as a simple proxy for cooperation in production-and reproduction.- - • --* "■■>/-'■

Population Policies : ; , ' - ■, ?

.■:•■■■ ' '-- .'-■17- ■ ■ ■•

There is an increasing consensus among governments that population factors play an important part in planning processes and shifts have been observed from a laissez-faire approach to expressions of need for compatibility between economic and population growth (ibid.). Now a majority of governments perceive growth rates as too high and there is increasing dissatisfaction with the persistently high levels of fertility.

Enquiries in the region by the Economic Commission for Africa have shown that a majority of countries responding perceive the "status" of women as having a significant influence on the demographic trends in their countries and many have accordingly formulated policies with a view to ensuring equal opportunities for women with their male counterparts.

A major concern in many cases is raising the age at marriage, to enable women to undergo longer periods of training for employment and to postpone the first birth. ,; . .

Recent UNECA studies on the subject have stressed that the design of an effective fertility policy requires taking into account the dynamics of family systems and within them women's roles (UNECA, -1990). For on the one hand "extended family structure" may favour large family norms and be an obstacle to the use of contraception (UNECA, 1987), on the other hand women's more modem roles in higher education and employment are identified with demographic and contraceptive innovation (UNECA, 1986). The implications drawn arethat in designing family planning programmes, governments should take more effective account of existing family structures and gender roles (UNECA, 1987). Indeed the failure of past population programmes to attain their set objectives in the region has been partly blamed upon the lack of understanding of the dynamic-nature of the socio-economic and demographic systems within which they-are located. < ' -■ ■;■

Economic policy-making ;! , ' * r

This accusation and concern has been paralleled by a similar realization in the economic sphere that the current attempts to restructure economies, which are actually based largely upon family-run agricultural and- micro-enterprises; are also likely to be doomed to failure, if the nature of the underlying familial systems is systematically ignored (Palmer, 1991). For as we shall see economic policy making and'related-programmes are-also belatedly having to face the reality that the-main production-units in the region are still family::based and-that neglect of the complexity and diversity and changes taking place in these systems, including female and male roles and sexual divisions of labour and resources, is likely to seriously hamper economic planning and progress. Moreover, given the intricate connections between economic and demographic change at both the micro- and macro-level the two need to be dealt with simultaneously. ":

POP/PAC.3/92/Inf.5 Page 4

These are themes which need to be taken up and addressed in the context of this paper, which focuses on some altering aspects of conjugal, parental and kin roles and their significance within the context of economic and demographic change..

FAMILY SOLIDARITY: CRISIS AND CHANGE

■'"'.- ■ . ■ * 'i

, ■■_ Africa is par excellence the region of the world .where women undergo a life long struggle,to combine reproductive and productive tasks and responsibilities within familial contexts. Their levels of both fertility and economic activity are higher than for any other region and they start both of these sets of activities at a younger age than in any other region.

At the same time their conjugal roles are characterized by greater distance, separation and autonomy than the roles of women in any other region. They, thus, depend to a great extent upon support from kin to carry out these heavy and frequently conflicting tasks.

At the present time, however, the migration of people for jobs and to escape political and ecological crises means that increasing numbers of women do not have that support from female kin and affines which was their wont.

In all societies, it is the types and amounts of assistance from kin and their male partners which defines the; reproductive success of women. In the African region, women typically depend upon considerable support from kin and affines. Men traditionally have been bound by bonds of marriage to more than one mother and child unit and have also maintained enduring bonds with male and female siblings, as well as maintaining important filial bonds, not only with parents who bore and begot them, but also the siblings of the latter. For the basic bond in African family systems are those between siblings on the one hand, and mothers and children on the other. Given these basic principles of sibling unity, solidarity, filial piety and responsibility, a wide variety of systems of kinship and marriage have been moulded. A particular characteristic formation of the region is the .presence of corporate descent group, which have managed and maintained basic forms of property and

people. . . ■ ■ .

. Changes in productive resources and the potential for individual earning of income to support one, if not more people, together with spatial mobility, have weakened the solidarity, and significance of. these descent groups, but for many they still remain the family hearth and. home, to which people repair in time of trouble and the enduring source of rootedness, in a particular community and cultural group. Mobile people with incomes and options still invest their life-time earnings and savings in training and maintaining kin. There is widespread evidence that the impacts of disastrous economic policies and programmes would be much harsher and cause even more debility and death than they have done, if these kin shelters were not available for those stricken by hard times, as sources of incomes disappear and opportunities for income are hard to find.

. .In the past and still, today, conjugal bonds prove frequently fragile. The enduring bonds between males and females remain those of siblingship and parento-filial ties.

However, as individualism increasingly.pervades economic life and as family farms for many are no longer the main source of sustenance, the solidarities of former times no longer hold and patterns of behaviour previously .common, fall into disuse or continue in a changed guise.

Parental control , . .

In the past a strategy which served to promote allocation of both female and male energy and material resources to productive success and long-term investment in children was

, Page 5 the strict control exercised by the older generation over the sexuality and reproductive powers of the young (see Lesthaeghe, ed. 1989). This was ensured through the strict upholding of . puberty ceremonies and the involvement of many relatives from two sets of kin in marriage

transactions, which in many cases involved the passing to the bride's family of considerable sums of wealth such as cows or manual labour. Moreover, nubile girls were carefully protected from the untoward advances of young men by strict segregation of the sexes or precise monitoring of sexual intercourse even after marriage.

'.."■■ \, ■ ■ ■■ . ■ ■

. ' These widespread-patterns of control and protection focusing upon young girls and women during the reproductive span, often involved the grandparental generation, who played a significant part in the rearing and training of the young. However, there is evidence on all sides that these traditional systems of controlling, monitoring, protecting and supporting the young are breaking down, in the face of massive spatial dislocation of people looking for new sources of security and support. - , ;- \ y

Many mothers increasingly do not have these supports either from husband, kin or affines, as they try, often with declining success, both to earn incomes, produce subsistence needs and services, and breast-feed, rear and socialize their young. Maternal resources are increasingly jeopardized and supports dwindling. ,.,■ , ' . .

, 1 I T

Between alternate generations of grandparents and grandchildren, relationships have been traditionally very close, without the tension and ambivalence which typifies much parent/child interaction. Given the residential patterns and likelihood of births to young women occurring in the households of the mother's parental generation, as well as fostering practices, grandmothers have frequently been the main carers of the young. Indeed in . contexts in which women have been noted for a combination of high fertility and heavy work schedules, the cooperation of kin, including older siblings, in child care, has been, of

paramount importance. , • - > '' :

Conjugal roles have been broadly characterized by polygyny, separation of economic interests, strict sexual divisions of labour and lack of intimacy and aloofness, with.the majority of women's lives being spent in a pregnant orlactating and sexually abstaining state.

The importance of these factors as supporting continuous high fertility in the region have been discussed elsewhere (Lesthaeghe, ed. 1989).

Impacts of social and spatial mobility

The spatial separation of siblings and parents and children, husbands,and wives through labour migration and the constraints of urban housing mean that increasing numbers of people are livings far from possibilities of customary kin support and care. Moreover in a growing number of instances individual access to and management of resources which can be privately allocated and controlled, that is cash income,-.instead of human labour, crops, cattle and land, - family. resources managed on behalf of kin groups,- means that the economic base of sibling solidarity is being whittled away and private property, individual incomes or personal penury are to some extent taking their place.

In such contexts questions are being posed as to whether traditional solidarities can survive; whether descent groups will disintegrate; whether rampant individualism will prevail; whether the vulnerable, old, young and pregnant and nursing mothers will be abandoned or still supported and who.are the categories of the population, who will suffer most, as changes of different kinds take place. . ■

POP/PAC.3/92/Inf.5 Page 6

Another important line of questioning is - what kinds of economic initiatives are being taken by families in order to survive the economic, political and ecological catastrophes now engulfing whole nations? What evidence is there of various sectors of the populations, women or children having to work harder? What evidence is there of new means of maintenance and novel livelihoods?

There is evidence in some communities of various kinds that traditional kinship solidarities are breaking down in urban areas, as the flows of rural urban-ward migration increases and urban residents are unable to extend the welcome hospitality traditional in former times (e.g. Sene, 1992). In other instances there is evidence that maintenance of kinship solidarities is preventing untold numbers of populations from sinking into destitution (e.g. Ahmed, 1991).

"CERPOD input required here"

Certainly it is clear that there is need to take a more dynamic perspective and examine fertility, mortality and mobility simultaneously within the context of changing family relationships, rather than as in the past allowing one topic to take the stage to the exclusion of the rest (Oucho, 1991). Unfortunately, to date, there is a painful lack of studies indicating the effects of migration on family life and vice-versa (ibid.).

At least from the demographic records there is evidence that declines in the size of co-resident domestic groups are widespread except1 in North Africa. Kin co-residence remains common. What is different is the increasing numbers of women-headed or female- maintained households which make up to as many as 20 or 30 per cent households in some regions. Many of the heads of these households are elderly women, others are mothers and their children, separated from their partners by labour migration or abandoned. Domestic groups with only one adult worker tend to be poorer than those in which there is more than one adult earner. About half of the household heads are widows. There is evidence to indicate that a comparatively greater share of the resources in female controlled households is allocated directly to dependent children and evidence from Ghana at least shows, that children are better served when there are several adult females co-residing (Blanc and Lloyd, in press).

THE ECONOMIC BASE: FAMILY SURVIVAL

An overview of the economic base indicates what are the main types of economic activity and sources of familial sustenance. Few workers are employed in industry, for industrialization in the region remains in its infancy, the weakest in the world. The Public sector of government service has been reduced and even the salaries cut. There is accordingly little hope of finding salaried or wage employment. Simply to survive most family members have to farm or engage in an array of petty- trades and cottage industries, often working with relatives.

Table 1 from a recent ILO analysis of the labour force situation in the region in the late eighties gives a simple overall indication of the orders of magnitude, composition, location, mobility and economic sectors of the total population (ILO, 1988). It shows clearly that only one-tenth of the recognized labour force participants are in wage employment in the modern sector. Individuals are as likely to be physically disabled as to be employed in the small, fragile, modern sector of the economies. Given the minute scale of the wage economy and the large numbers of annual entrants into the labour force, it can absorb only a tiny

POP/APC.3/92/Inf.5 ''Page 7 fraction of theni. Annual-numbersof labour force entrants will soon be as numerous as the total numbers already in wage employment. ' j ■ • ■ >■ -

'* ... .. - . ■ '.>, . • ■■ ■ i . .-

Family firms " '■ 1 / ; - • .

There is growing realization among labour economists that in fact small businesses are likely to be family businesses and that kinship serves' instead of the more impersonal relationships of economic institutions (e.g. Ahmed, 1992): Obviously the contrasting systems of family relations in different-regions and ethnic groups will profoundly influence the organization of production (Greenhalgh, 1991). Little is known:about women in the informal sector, but global economic restructuring processes are leading to labour deregulation increasing informalization and feminization; (Standing, 1989). This informal, family 1 embedded sector hides large numbers, of women reported to be only involved in domestic work and not productive labour. This type of socially embedded work is most extensive in sub-Saharan Africa where 98 per cent of women in commerce and 86 per cent in manufacturing are employed on their own account or as family labour. Own account work of women is more widespread in Africa than any where else in the world (see tables 1 and

! 2).. Clearly, the large proportion of women working on their own account mirrors the pattern

■ of generally separate economies for men and women and the relative economic independence of women in the region,' especially in the West, though not necessarily (socio-economic

status) (see-Greenhalgh, 1991).3 ' ' " r ■ -,

Agriculture still employs about two thirds of the region's labour force. It provides not only food but raw materials for agro-based industries and the bulk of commodity exports. It is the major source of income for the rapidly expanding population arid vitally important for food security. Women's food production and farming responsibilities are inextricably enmeshed in their rights and duties as wives and mothers (e.g. Whitehead, in press). Most people are also engaged in non- farm activities including trade, crafts and services. -

Agriculture is a sector in which women's work still goes for a large part officially unrecognized and undocumented (Dixon, 1985). Indeed neglect of women's roles as food producers and cash crop farmers has in the past been increasingly implicated in the poor performance of this sector.* The region is notable for the poor and erratic recording of the economic activities of women in official labour force-statistics and other- surveys (Anker, in press).

Recent globally synthesized statistical evidence on women's roles has shown that the gaps in hours between men's and women's work in the region are actually greater in Africa than in1 all the rest of the world except for Asia and the Pacific. For studies have shown women to be working 12 to 13 hours a week more than men.' Moreover, the prevalent economic crises are noted to increase the working hours of the poorest women, as they struggle to maintain their families (UN, 1991:82). Men in'the region do little of the work accounted domestic, which in this region is a heavy load of subsistence labour. Women's lack of alternative sources of support are such that in middle and old "age, they are far more

likely than women in the rest of the world to still have to be economically active, even after

60 (UN, 1991:86).

Unemployment and Underemployment ,,

In many countries as the annual numbers of school leavers seeking jobs increases, the

actual numbers of wage earning jobs decreases. Youths'who: may have gone to school in

POP/PAC.3/92/Inf.5 , Page 8

order to earn wages in employment are frustrated. Educated unemployment is growing and underemployment in rural and urban areas a source of anxiety to many individuals and governments. This problem is particularly serious since "unemployed" young men may also remain in actual fact "economically inactive" - a serious loss of human energy to their families and nations.

Educated women are known to have suffered even more than their male counterparts in this regard, - given their concentration in the most vulnerable areas of wage and salaried employment, including nursing, teaching and social welfare - the very sectors cut back by the harsh Structural Adjustment Policies (ILO, 1991).

African women have a smaller proportion of professional and clerical jobs than anywhere else in the world and only in Africa did women's recorded economic participation

rates decline as a result of economic crises during the past two decades (UN, 1991:86).

Insecurity and Poverty . . . •■ . ,

In addition to the fact that rapidly increasing numbers of job seekers are chasing a dwindling number of formal sector jobs, of diminishing security and stability, other factors are affecting the economic security and levels of living of families. These include falling real wages of urban workers, in some cases dramatically pushing the.families of the employed well below the poverty line and unable to purchase sufficient food to prevent malnutrition. They include the blurring of the distinction between the formal and informal sectors, including decreasing, difference in incomes, as well as narrowing of urban/rural wage gaps. Furthermore the overall distribution of income in most countries has worsened.

Moreover migration from rural to urban areas has not decreased. The latter.is part of a

complex and dynamic struggle to survive in the face of falling real incomes for the poor, both urban and rural (Jamal and Weeks, 1988).,

• Many workers have in the past managed to take part in both rural and urban economic

sectors, through circulatory migration and to work simultaneously in the formal and informal

economies through moonlighting (ibid). Now as the economic crisis has deepened, these strategies have become increasingly important, with family members diversifying as they can in petty trade or farming and wage earning.

The Informal sector

Petty trades occupy an estimated quarter to three-quarters of the labour force in towns and cities. This so-called "informal sector" is increasingly making room for rural migrants, the unemployed from the modern sector, school drop outs and school leavers (Maldonado,

1989). The informal sector is particulary important for the survival of women and their families, especially poor women in petty trade or home-based industries, such as beer

brewing and tailoring. Some studies have shown that the importance of such informal sector

earnings of women increased dramatically in the past decade, in view of the ongoing

economic crisis (UN, 1991:92). .

Four million and more people annually are moving from rural to urban areas in search of survival. It is agriculture and the so-called "informal sector" of self-employment and small family enterprises which is keeping the majority of these people alive. The jobless and

impoverished are saved from utter destitution by the shelter afforded by already poor kin

(e.g. Ahmed, 1992). The urban-ward migration is often basically a survival strategy adopted

out of dire necessity (Vaa,. 1987). ,

Page 9 Some sectors are, .saturated by the growing competition. Others have; scope for expansion. A number of factors hinder the growth of-this sector: lack of capital, training, poor management skills. A major problem is the isolation and lack of organization of small- scale producers and the discrimination they face, from the authorities who favour the large enterprises. International assistance has highlighted the fact that such initiatives can go a long way to consolidate precarious jobs, raise the level of production and income and create new employment. Participatory approaches by local organizations have been found most effective and. the potential of micro-enterprises is now beginning to be much better . documented, as small-scale industries become a focus of interest and study (Rasmussen et al.,

Training , , - ._ r\- , ,,

, '• In view of the economic crisis realization has grown that existing training systems are for the most part inappropriate and need to be reoriented away from preparation for,non- .existent wage employment, towards preparation for self-employment and entrepreneurship and towards greater emphasis^on in-service training and a more open approach,, directed towards those ,who inthe past, have suffered neglect, including women (ILO, 19.89.: 12).,

. Just as.many,find their livelihoods outside the modern wage sector, in the same way the majority/acquire their skill's outside the public training system. These training methods include traditional, apprenticeship systems, particularly in West Africa, where these systems axe often in the guise of fostering arrangements and transfers of people and skills are marked

by appropriate rituals .and rites of passage.4 ■

.Training activities are also organized by youth cooperatives or.associations of informal sector artisans. Private vocational training schools also play a part. Despite the importance of the rural sector, skill training for rural workers is a modest affair in some countries and negligible in most others. , .A ;,, -^ . ■ > -.,,,■-

Rural women, who represent the single most important group of .producers in all Africa, are also the least trained for their multiple tasks. Formal agricultural training in special schools at the secondary or tertiary level is largely confined to men, who represent a minute fraction of persons engaged in farming and who more.often than not, are reluctant to go back to farming. Rural trade schools are unhappily rare in Africa (ILO, 1988:16).

Training is accordingly for the most part judged to be irrelevant, of limited coverage, discriminatory (unequal opportunities for women) and poor in quality (ibid.)."

Women's deprivations j . ,

Illiteracy is especially acute among women. Not only do fewer girls go to school but far more drop out because of early marriage and teenage pregnancy. This low educational

base limits their higher level training, which is biased towards traditional female skills! the

nature of women's employment reflects their limited participation in training. The few in the modern sector are usually channelled, into low status, low paid, traditional, female occupations. Beyond the modern sector, women of all ages from child hood onwards take part in rural subsistence production and in a wide variety of informal sector activities, such

as trading, food and beverage production, pottery, sewing, handicrafts. These are described as almost always at.low levels of productivity,(ILO, 1988).5- '< / , ,

There is evidence of poorer health of women.and their increasing time strain, as they attempt to carry out an even larger array of energy-consuming tasks, at a time when access

POP/PAC.3/92/Ihf.5 Page 10

to modern health services is diminishing, as the services themselves are cut down and the

numbers needing them quickly escalate (e.g. Turshen, 1991).6

African women have the reputation of being the most economically independent in the developing world. However, autonomy may not necessarily be linked to economic mobility because family obligations may rather come before growth of business (Greenhalgh,1991).

On the enterprise level family arrangements for the transmission of property, division-of labourand distribution of certain rights, tangibly affect women's access to resources critical to business establishment and expansion; In spite of considerable work over two decades on the informal sector, remarkably little is generally known about women's position in it. Nor has there been sufficient attention paid to the fact in much economic analysis, that such firms

are embedded in family systems (see Greenhalgh, 1991).8

A recent ILO study has examined the evidence available on women entrepreneurs in the region (Karlin, 1992). A large proportion of women are working in the context of micro- enterprise ownership and management:(see tables 2 and 3). Many of them are self-employed and working alone, with their children as their only source of assistance and labour. For women heading households this enterprise may be the sole source of survival for themselves and their dependents. Moreover in households with multiple earners dependence upon women's income is rising. But women's earning potential in micro-enterprises' is hampered by a wide range of obstacles, in addition to those common to their male counterparts. First, the 'general business environment; shaped by government policies, favours large-scale enterprises' at the expense of micro-units. Second, women are often legal minors, defined as dependent upon men - their fathers or husbands. This may inhibit their independent decision-making and reinforce their dependency upon husbands and fathers. Property ownership is mainly beyond their reach. In addition, the customary sexual division of labour confines women's economic activities to a narrow band of products and services within the traditional sector of the economy, - mainly those which are an extension of household production, such as food processing and selling, sewing, etc. .

During the colonial period women were kept out of critical resources and entrepreneurial opportunities associated with modernization. Their activities continue to be typically low in capital requirements and to use traditional skills, learnt from their mothers

and other female relatives. Overcrowding of women entrepreneurs in a narrow band of

products and services limits profitability and means that diversification needs encouraging, if greater income potential is to be ensured.

Other factors hampering women's business development are their multiple time and energy consuming responsibilities - conjugal, maternal and domestic. These entail infant care, farming, fuel and water gathering, etc. Recent attempts to document the unpaid household work of women, which is basic to the subsistence and survival ofmost families in the region, have shown it to be energy-draining, back-breaking and time-consuming but still very poorly ' documented and lacking in systematic comparable evidence. The main fact known; besides

its volume and importance, is that this work is carried out by women <alone with their

children and is scarcely mechanized or served by adequate infrastructure, such a pipe born water, transport facilities, etc. Some of the existing fragmentary evidence has been to demonstrate the significance of this activity and to support the point that this-work and how it is done is highly relevant to a variety of population,"development and labour policies

(Goldschmidt-Clermont, 1987; 1991)-. For it absorbs a large amount of time and physical

labour, preventing it from being allocated to other activities including breast-feeding, child

care, agriculture, income earning, etc. Accordingly it has as yet unmeasured effects upon maternal and infant mortality and experts continuing pressure for high fertility, since women

Page .11 alone without required machines and infrastructure can■> in no way accomplish these subsistence activities without the indispensable help of children who provide a renewable and

ever ready source of needed energy. :■ - ■' • :. j ■

Lower levels of education and training limit women's capacity for vocational and technical training. Moreover, available training is concentrated on domestic-related, skills.

Access to credit is limited. Women lacking collateral and business and management training are unable to convince banks to lend them money. Informal sources of credit are expensive and use up profits. Women have to rely on husbands and relatives and their own savings for, capital to begin. Thus capital investments are low and profits also minimal and few grow to. be classified as small-scale enterprises. Illiteracy prevents official written recording of transactions. Transport problems are widespread. Appropriate machinery is not available or not at an affordable price; ' . "

With a view to attempting to alleviate some of these problems increasing stress is being placed on the need for women to.be fully integrated into the cooperative and trade union movements in the region (ILO, 1989).

Women's time and energy crisis • . . . ■. r ;

:' An important method for analysing the conflicts and1 complementarities and changes occurring in women's various roles and for measuring demographic impacts through effects on child health and survival, and the pressure for high fertility-is the method of documenting time allocation (e.g. Popkin and Doan, 1990). Majordemands on women's time, required for survival of family members, include domestic work, child care and feeding, and work outside the home. In times of environmental stress the hours spent in tasks such as water fetching and fuel carrying may multiply to such an extent that great stress is experienced and

inability to cope with other tasks. >k number of studies have shown the hours a day which

may be required for these activities, in' times' of drought and. fuel depletion. Among the adverse effects of lack of time and energy to cope with all conflicting demands likely to affect health and survival are: maternal malnutrition, low birth weight, and poor child growth and development. The latter result from inadequate or truncated breast-feeding, which in turn can lead to closely spaced and high parity births. These in turn may result in low economic productivity, leading to low incomes,* low levels of. material assets, and

returning cycles of poverty and deprivation. , ■,

Such demands on women's time'and energy are affected by an array of factors including the availability of other child care givers or availability of domestic labour, often provided by older children. Numerous studies of time allocation in different cultural settings have indicated that women *s work is often done for longer hours than their male counterparts . and that child care is mainly carried out simultaneously with a variety of tasks and often delegated to siblings, and others. Such is the nature of most of the data, however, that the picture is often static and tells little about how changes in maternal roles are affected by market work, etc., and may in turn affect child health and nutrition through its impact on the patient and careful inputs of women's time which-are essential, for these (Popkin and

Doan, 1990). :.

...' .. '' - ■<• ■ ■

Increasingly a variety of studies by agriculturalists, nutritionists, health workers and others are reaching" the same kinds of conclusions. Since women in poor countries typically work so hard and for so long their time is a major constraint. It may prevent the introduction of new agricultural techniques, since they have no more time available for weeding. It may prevent the introduction of healthinitiatives, since they have no spare time

POP/PAC.3/92/Inf.5 Page 12

to walk miles to clinics or to visit health workers. It may.prevent the sanitary procedures and maintenance of household cleanliness and the prolongation of breast-feeding, needed to prevent diarrhoeal diseases and thus promotion of child survival and child spacing because there are too many other calls upon their precious time and energy. And yet these are the women who have often been classified in official statistics as unemployed, non-working,

"housewives". , ;-.

Health studies have shown that small changes in women's household and child care practices can have, marked impacts upon children's health and survival; by improving sanitation, quality of water, food, hygiene, etc. Similarly, prolongation of exclusive breast feeding diminishes the likelihood of infant sickness. The time costs of health initiatives, such as immunization and family planning clinics, may be so prohibitive however that they prevent take up of services, with consequent results upon health and well-being. Studies of the effects of maternal care, stimulation, play, touch have shown the significance of these for satisfactory, infant growth and well-being. Yet the demands upon women's time may be such that they are unable to devote sufficient attention to these infant needs. . ...,,.

A surprising finding is the paucity of literature looking at the consequences for infant care, of maternal work patterns and responsibilities. Mother's.conditions of work and earnings level are noted to be crucial to child development outcomes. But few studies have looked at these impacts in detail or at the effects of the care of substitute care givers. Studies of women in farming have shown that few women take their children to the farming site and several studies have demonstrated a link between children's sickness and times of heavier farming work. Few. studies, however, carefully document child care and the resources

allocated, to, it. ■ '

- The policy importance of the time women spendln back breaking, subsistence, non- market, as well as market work, is increasingly being realized. If the time needed for some of. these activities can be decreased then time allocated to productive work and health needs, as well as child care can be increased.

Adequate child care is an important intermediary between women' s types of economic activity, and child welfare. The widespread nature and effects of child care by children is only recently being addressed by specific programmes (e.g. UNICEF child to child

programmes). . . • ■ .

The need for more research on maternal role changes and their impacts on health;

of studies of child care; of changes in household production through introduction of new technologies,,etc., have been noted (Popkin and Doan, 1990). More needs to be known about how women's bargaining power changes in-the home, as a result of her income generation, of the ways in which maternal role activities and time, allocations change when they enter labour forces or have access to new technologies, etc.- . i •••

YOUTH: PRODUCTIVE AND REPRODUCTIVE ROLE TRANSITIONS The numbers and proportions of the youth in the population are increasing rapidly into the next century: In fact Africa is the only major region of the world where the proportion of the youth population in the year 2000 will be larger than it is at present (UN, 1986). In 1950 the youth population of Africa, was 41.5 million. By 1985 it had more than doubled to 105.4 million. In the year 2000 it is projected to increase to 170,000. In fact urban African youth form the most rapidly growing sector of youth for any world region (see table

Page 13' 4). The increase in the proportion of youth residing in urban areas is projected at around a quarter in 1970 to around a half by the end of the century.

Recent national and regional reports have reflected the mounting concern that the growing numbers of youths are encountering serious problems, as they reach the stage of transition to adulthood: to occupations and to parenthood (OAU, 1991a; Ministry of Labour, Addis Ababa, 1991). Whereas in a former era these transitions were facilitated and controlled within the contexts of kin groups and community institutions, now girls and boys, young men and women, who have been drafted into schools are found to be in many cases without skills and resources needed to become either parents or productive and responsible . workers. Traditional knowledge has been marginalized and often modern knowledge and resources have not taken their place, leaving a serious hiatus, in which growing numbers of youth are both unemployed and unproductive. They lack useful skills especially for fanning, and also lack the parenting resources and skills to become successful mothers and fathers of' the next generation.

Traditional socialization r. ' : ! '

■'■ Traditionally children grew and were trained in familial contexts to become adult - workers in homes, markets, farms and crafts. Young men remained dependents in the households of senior kinsmen with little or nopersonal resources, working for many years under the supervision of senior kinsmen, on whom they often depended for payment of bridewealth, without which it was often impossible to marry. Girls learnt wifely and maternal skills in the home until marriage, which occurred soon after puberty. Often these processes of socialization took place under the tutelage of kin, as fostering of children until, adulthood and marriage was a pervasive norm in many societies. Rites of passage of various kinds, frequently combining symbolic dramas and practical training, often marked the beginning of the reproductive span for girls or initiation into manhood for boys. Genital mutilation soon after birth or later was a common component of ritualized practices for both sexes. Serious kin and community sanctions constrained sexual behaviour to adhere to- culturally accepted norms which varied between ethnic groups. Often full adulthood was"

only achieved after the demise of all parental figures in the kin groups which might mean the period now designated middle age. In older years the authority of the ancestors and their

spiritual dictates still held sway. - ' ■ '■■■■■ :

These processes of socialization and training in-specialist skills were complex and continuous in nature. They-also served to augment the familial labour force and inculcate- filial respect, obedience and diligence. In addition they ensured the inter-generational- transmission of the patrimony. Parents were accordingly often in the past and still today

loath to send their children to school. For school attendance truncated these processes and

the outcomes of school attendance were unsure. Among a host of imponderables, sexual- protection of girls and their good'marriage prospects could not be guaranteed.9

Certainly many parental fears have been substantiated by massive school attendance, for while some youths have gone on to take up well paying jobs in the modem sectors of economies, others have fallen by the wayside economically and clearly traditional constraints to sexual relations and child bearing among teenagers have been flouted; both rules concerning births outside marriage and also the tempo of pregnancies. In a number of cases curves of fertility by education show-a U-shape, - with girls with little schooling neither maintaining traditional birth spacing practices nor adopting innovations assumed by the more highly educated, leading past observers of fertility rates in the region to note upward

tendencies rather than lowering-of rates. '*.... -.-.-.

POP/PAC.3/92/Inf.5.

Page 14

The truth is that the processes of rural urban migration, schooling and the^ search for.

jobs have split many of the youth from their elders and the sources of traditional socialization, customary knowledge, experience and control and have resulted in the fact that almost half will be in urban areas by the year 2000 AD, and many of these will be beyond

control or support of kin. .

Schooling

The numbers of the youth in school has been advancing rapidly. Between 1960 and 1983 the number of primary and secondary students increased from about 13 to 63 million, leading to massive increases in the literacy of the adult workforce and the numbers of job seekers with some schooling. However, half of the children of primary school age are not in school and are already helping parents and relatives in some type of survival tasks in farms, markets and craft workshops. -:

Often girl are detained from school in times of scarcity. In addition their vulnerability to teenage pregnancies causes them to drop out of school. Parents also more frequently withdraw them from school than their male peers and set them to domestic tasks and trading to ensure family survival, when parents are hard pressed to make ends meet.

Such sex inequalities, in access to schooling have profound demographic and economic consequences, and increase and perpetuate systems of; sexual inequality of resources and opportunities. What is more the female/male gap in education has a high cost, for there is evidence that mother's education is one of the most critical important determinants of the families health and nutrition.

Sexual relations

For well nourished girls menafche appears earlier. Meanwhile marriage is tending to be postponed and even does not materialize for the few. There is region-wide evidence, that teenage sexual relations are common and that in the case of girls many of these contacts are with older men. Levels of activity, vary between different countries (Gage-Brandon and Meekers, 1992). Data from the Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) conducted in 11 countries indicated that at least 50 per cent of the teenage girls 15-19 had sexual relations' In a number of countries more than half of them were not married.10 Some studies have

shown that while large numbers of teenagers do not approve of such behaviour, they still engage in it, indicating considerable confusion and ambivalence about a topic on which there is often little relevant information from any knowledgable source, including parents, school

teachers, peers or community groups. .

A significant fact is that while contraceptive use is low for women and men it is even lower among girls and boys in their teens." Lack of access is a major barrier to use. In some countries reluctance to provide information and services on family, planning to the youth has been turned into a ban on contraceptives to the youth. In a recent UN survey 6 out of 18 countries did not provide contraceptives to unmarried teenagers and only one in 5 countries indicated that Family Life Education is included in the school curriculum.

This unprotected sexual intercourse among the youth has a number of serious and unintended consequences economic, demographic and social. In 10 of 11 countries surveyed in the DHS at least 1 out of every 5 teenagers had one or more children or was currently pregnant at the time (Population Reference Bureau, 1991). Indeed a high proportion of all births are to teenage mothers many of whom are ill-equipped and lack the social support from kin or husbands to be mothers.12 High rates of unplanned pregnancies are followed

Page 15

by reliance on abortion, for many,of the pregnant girls are in schobi and want to finish their

education and where possible move oh to vocational training.

The usually insurmountable difficulties of continuing education while pregnant or nursing mean that unsafe and illegal abortions are often the mode chosen to resolve an' impasse.13 Such early child" bearing, as is well documented, leads to heavy tolls both

economic and medical.14 : . ,

A region-wide waste of serious proportions is the extent to which school girls continue to have to drop out of school as a result of pregnancies.15 "Other serious outcomes include rejection by the fathers of their children and their own relatives, baby dumping, poverty and even prostitution. Children born in such circumstances often perpetuate a cycle of deprivation. The heavy costs to education programmes, in terms of the wastage of pupils may be enormous. The tolls of morbidity and mortality from sexually transmitted diseases may increase rapidly in.future given present trends.16 ' . , ' , \

Youth Programmes ' ".",.*' , * . . :

Various institutions and programmes have tried to counteract these problems. They include Family Life. Education in schools as well as activities of churches and youth organizations, aided by several international organizations. , Even when information on reproductive health is supposed to have been made available, however, the basic facts are often unknown with serious consequences.17 A number of successful programmes of information and service delivery have been designed including peer counsellors at the' university level, (Nigeria) among out of school groups (Sierra Leone) and youth centres for teenage mothers (Tanzania), and youth sectors of national family associations (e.g. Ethiopia,.

Kenya).

In view of the need for improving and'strengthening youth programmes the African Regional office of the IPPF has recently made several recommendations including the following: there should be more advocacy through relevant studies to raise awareness of policy-makers of problems faced by youth; guidelines are needed on the type of information and services appropriate; Family Life education should be institutionalized for both in and out of school youth and all channels both traditional and modern as appropriate should be

utilized.18 " . ' ' ' '

MARRIAGE

On the whole, men tend to be older when they marry and admit social paternity.

Indeed, age gaps between spouses are'larger in this region than in any other and are the, source of the extra female marriageable years, which make the continued practice of polygyny possible. Implications of this age gap include greater likelihood of inequalities and dependence for young wives and increased likelihood of. experiencing widowhood in older

age groups. ,-...'

Analysis over the life cycle of women and men reveals that in fact marriage is often an age-related phenomenon. It is more common among older males and younger women.

Large proportions of older women are typically husbandless alone with their'childreri, with significant implications for mother-child dependency: .that is both dependency of children upon mothers when they are young arid dependency of women upon their children during old

POP/PAC.3/92/Inf.5 Page 16

age, when they are separated, divorced or widowed. Children typically provide their mothers with assistance in their youth and support and maintenance in their old age.

Marriage and parenthood remain virtually universally sought and achieved goals of

adult life, indeed social maturity, itself can scarcely be reached without their prior

attainment, although deviance from these customary norms has begun to appear.

Age at Marriage

The age at which females become mothers or marry is a critical life cycle event, which not only affects female chances of maturation, social development and economic autonomy, it also marks by and large the end of the formal learning process extending from birth to reproduction. Globally there is a high correlation between the ages of women at marriage and literacy, indicating that the age of girls at marriage is a key variable in the development process at both the individual and national level. Given the unique role of women in child rearing their cycle of learning is quite fundamental to the progress and development of the younger generation. So it is not surprising that one of the clearest and best documented demographic correlations of the past decade has been the link between female education and child survival health and development (Cleland, 1989; Caldwell, 1990;

Hobcraft, 1992). Higher levels of female education have also been associated with demographic and contraceptive innovation - lower family size and adoption of modern family planning methods. In addition it has been argued that the degree of cultural advancement of any group is necessarily connected with such a fundamental factor as the length of the learning process.(Todd, 1987).

The region, however, continues to be characterized by both the lowest levels of schooling found globally for girls as well as the lowest ages at first birth and marriage.

Given the profound demographic, economic, medical and social impacts of these continuing trends, the grave importance of raising the age at marriage in law and in reality continues to be stressed in many fora (e.g. Mensa-Bonsu, 1991).

There are in fact some changes documented in percentages, of teenage marriage recorded over a period of two decades or so (see table 5). At one point in time singulate mean age at marriage is higher on average by several years for girls with seven or more years or secondary level schooling (See table 6). The levels of teenage marriage still remain the highest in the world however, in spite of these changes.

Types of union

Recent studies have shown that traditional marriage practices still persist to a large extent; practices such as cousin marriage, bridewealth payments and arrangement of marriages by senior kin (e.g. N'Diaye et al., 1992 on Senegal). It is in fact quite usual for a variety of different marriage forms and types of conjugal relationships to coexist in the same community and there is frequently a plurality of laws, with new forms of marital unions emerging." Indeed, at the present time there is evidence that marital relationships are becoming even more fluid and diverse than in the past, especially as conjugal forms diversify in the wake of rapid societal transformations (Bledsoe, 1990; Agounke, 1991, Donadje, 1991). A "state of flux" is not uncommon in urban areas, where many diverse factors are influencing behaviour (Burnham, 1987; Isiugo-Abanihe et al., 1991).

The sophistication, complexity and variety in African systems of marriage means that their documentation requires more than the simplistic marital status attributes collected in

POP/APCJ/92/Inf^

Page 17

standard, demographic surveys, r There is however a dirth of systematic" cross cultural evidence on conjugal roles and relationships, either within or across countries. There is,' however, clear evidence that at least in some countries there is an increasing tendency for marriage to lack formality and to be increasingly fragile and unstable; ., , l

. An array of evidence shows that there is.a considerable variation from country to"

country in;the prevalence of consensual unions.19 Recent data from the Demographic and Health Surveys showed a large variation in the region in their incidence. Prevalence-is for example noted to be low in Kenya and Ghana but high in Liberia;- Uganda and Botswana.

Considerable differences are also noticeable between different sectors of the same population,"

with consensual unions tending to be more common among the younger, urban and educated women. In the Ivory Coast and Uganda the higher prevalence has been attributed to the high cost of bridewealth. Some have noted that better educated women may voluntarily avoid marriage, in favour of informal unions (e.g. Antoine and Nanitelamio,.1990). Such unions may give them more autonomy.-..Few studies have.looked.at differences in fertility or'

conjugal relationship by, union type.21?• : ';;< :

* * V

^{21?.. -} t ;. ■. • ^ ,

Sub-Saharan Africa remains the only major world region in which polygyny is still**

widely practised despite modern religious and legal attempts to constrain its incidence.

Polygyny is potentially universal. The actual proportion of polygynous unions varies-from/-- sub region to sub region. Although only a minority of marriages at one point in time may be polygynous, there is a high risk for both women and men of the individual's being in such a union during the whole marital career. Current economic and social changes might be expected to alter the balance of economic, sexual, social and demographic advantage-to be gained by either men or women, from polygynous marriage, but there is insufficient evidence to show whether the incidence is decreasing or increasing in different communities and social "'

strata. . „■ ; ■ *■* ■ ■• . ■

A recent.attempt to show-trends over time in three countries;using WFS and DHS* : data for Kenya, Senegal and Ghana indicated that there may be decreasing trends in - • polygynous marriages (Wong and Marindo Tanganai, 1992). Higher levels of polygyny are found among.illiterates, ^especially illiterate men- However, there still remain substantial minorities of polygynous marriages among literates, including those with higher education There are substantial variations between countries. ■ Problems in the definition of work status ■:

for. women make it difficult to examine differences in marital status among working women. ' Women's religious affiliation is not associated with higher or lower levels of polygyny. ■ Wong and Marindo Tanganai (1992) are of the opinion tharecbhomic changes may force a decline, despite the continuity.of social and cultural values approving or stimulating polygyny. In fact there.are signs from various sources that while formal polygyny may be declining in some contexts, it is in many cases being replaced, -especially in urban areas by de facto polygyny "deuxieme bureaux", outside marriage and "sugar daddy" relations (Dinan, 1983; Bledsoe, 1990). This permutation of forms obviously makes it even more difficult to observe or, deduce linkages with fertility levels. . • -:.i •-. '-■'. .. ..■

The roles of women in production are viewed as being linked to the continuity of-<

polygyny and in the cities it is the heads of impoverished households who are forced to' •■•

renounce polygyny (ibid. p. 58). A study in Togo indicated that the unemployed were the ■"

least likely to be polygynous.

The overall effects of polygyny on fertility at the society level are unclear (eg Goldman and Pebley, 19.89)... At the level of the individual women they make it possible for

all women to. find a husbands -,.»..

POP/PAC.3/92/Inf.5- Page 18

Not only does polygyny die hard but aspects of polyandry may be reinforced or appear, leading to what Gueyer has named "polyandrous motherhood" whereby a woman may manage ties with several men at once to maximize her children's advantage in such a way making marriage almost incidental to her reproductive career (Guyer, 1988; Bledsoe, 1990:119). Higher education for women restricts the numbers of eligible men available for monogamous marriage (e.g. Oppong and Abu, 1987 on Ghana). In effect at the present time different wives may be married by different procedures'and their relationships with their husbands may vary according to a variety of factors - co-residence, education level, employment status, number of children etc., as well as emotional attachment. Moreover

many spouses do not co-reside. t .■:

Migration has potentially profound impacts upon conjugal relations providing opportunities and incentives to have more than one wife located in urban and or rural areas and there are growing numbers of mother-child units visited by husbands- a modem' adaptation of polygyny and one- which may give educated wives the greater degree of freedom and autonomy they seek. The traditional control of the kin group and the husband' on these mother-centred units is said to be looser and in the case of conflict, separation more

frequent (Locoh, 1988). ... . ' - : •

Women alone r . ■ -• ■ ■■■ "

Cross-national comparisons show quite different profiles of nuptiality in different countries. For example Ghana, with its large matrilineal population'and traditional patterns of duolocal residence for spouses, exhibits far higher levels of separate conjugal residence, marital dissolution and remarriage than either Senegal or Kenya (Gandaho, 1992). In Ghana increasing divorce rates are linked to urban residence, education; Christian affiliation and employment status. Rising trends in remarriage are also apparent. These varied findings on types of unions and divorce indicate that, at least in some countries and in some social sectors, there is an increasing tendency for marriage to lack formality and to be increasingly

fragile and unstable. , ■ ..

One thing which is quite clear is that the proportion of women and children alone arid'' of female headed and maintained households is increasing. In some countries as many as a ...

third or more of domestic groups are in this position. Insome countries such as Ghana and Senegal growing numbers of monogamously married women are living separately from their husbands (Gandaho, 1992). For some women this is a status forced upon them by male migration and abandonment. For others it is a conscious choice, a strategy for survival until other options may be available. For women alone in either urban or rural areas there are problems, to be faced, unknown a generation ago as they struggle to ensure survival of themselves and children.

Women headed or maintained households are not necessarily poorer. Indeed data from a variety of studies indicate that they can in fact be better off arid children; better nourished, if a larger proportion of resources are channelled directly to them (e.g. Ahmed, 1992 the case of Gambia). However, given the potential vulnerability of these households there may be a strong case for targeting them specifically with different types' of aid

resources.. ■ . • -

Sexuality and disease transmission

Traditionally women have spent many of their reproductive years abstaining from conjugal sexual relations and often at menopause or as grandmothers have had the option of