A brief look at Iranian demographics

Iran's demographic structure is characterized by the huge baby boom of the 1970s and 1980s. The Iranian population more than doubled in recent years, rising from 33 million in 1976 to some 70 million in 2006, with a very high proportion of young people produced by the baby boom of the early to mid-1980s that saw TFRs in some regions approach 10 (!). The story, of how, despite restrictions placed on women, heavy investment in infrastructure, education, and health care--along with the sanctioning of contraceptive use--precipitated a rapid demographic transition, while a difficult economic situation and the bloody 1980-1988 war with Iraq cause women to delay their first births, space their second births, and to limit the growth of their families, moving towards a two-child norm, is well-known. Mohammad-Jabal Abbasi-Shavasi's paper "Recent Changes and the Future of Fertility in Iran" (PDF format) outlines the historical background for Iran's rapid fertility decline, noting how access to family planning, improved access to education for girls, a greatly improved public health infrastructure, considerably improved transportation and economic pressures to produce a transition in the space of two decades to replacement-level fertility. Abbasi-Shavasi further predicts that as Iran becomes still more urban, producing a more educated and more woman-friendly society, national fertility rates will continue to fall to sub-replacement levels. An abstract of a recent paper ( Mehyarh and Agraganian, "Below Replacement Fertility in Iran: A District Level Analysis of the 2006 Census") reveals further startling data about the extent of the decline.

A large-scale DHS-type survey conducted in October-November 2000 indicated that total fertility rates of Iranian couples had dropped to 2.0 (1.7 in urban areas vs. 2.4 in rural areas). TFR figures for the total population of provinces derived from this survey ranged from 1.4 to 4.1, being below replacement level (2.1) in 14 of the 28 provinces. Total fertility rates of urban couples ranged from 1.3 to 3.5 but rose above 2.0 in urban areas of nine of the 28 provinces only, being above 2.4 in only one province (Qom, 2.7) and above 3.0 in another one (Sistan-Baluchestan, 3.5). In rural areas, too, provincial TFRs varied between 1.5 and 4.7. They were below 2.1 in ten of the 28 provinces and rose above 3 in only three provinces (Khuzestan, 3.2; Hormozgan, 3.3 and Sistan-Baluchestan, 4.7).

[. . .]

Thus, according to the 2006 census, over 80% of the population of Iran belong to provinces with clearly below replacement fertility rates. Among these, there are 10 provinces with very low TFR values (ranging from 1.15 to 1.45). They contain over 52% of total, 57% of urban and 41.4% of the rural population of Iran. Of the urban population, 66% live in 16 provinces with very low TFRs (1.15-1.5). In rural areas too, only 41.2% of the population live in provinces with TFRs ranging from 2 to 3.7, while over one-third belong to provinces where the TFR of rural population is less than 1.7. Considering district level variations, it is found that only one of the 336 districts has a crude birth rate exceeding 30 (Saravan District in the south eastern Province of Sistan-Baluchestan with a CBR of 31.6, implying a TFR of 4.3). In 54 districts CBR values vary between 20-30 (indicating TFRs vaying between 2.5 and 4.0). In another 96 districts CBR values are found to range between 17-19.9 (TFR equivalents being 2.1 to 2.5). Thus in 155 districts (or 45% of districts) total fertility rate of Iranian couples would seem to be above replacement level. The population of these 155 districts is however only 37% of the total population of Iran.

As noted here, Ahmadinejad's simultaneous calls for a near-doubling of the Iranian population to 120 million and a denunciation of the demographic transition are quite likely futile, and would besides detract from a demographic structure relatively favourable compared to those of its neighbouring countries.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s recent remarks, appealing to Iranian legislators to take steps to boost the country’s population from 70 to 120 million and condemning the country’s recent attainment of the two-child family, raise questions about the Islamic republic’s demographic future. Because Iranian women’s average fertility is near (and perhaps below) the replacement level,1 demographers project the country’s youthful population (15-to-29 year olds comprise about one-half of all adults) is on track to develop, within a decade, into an older, more manageable age structure resembling those of East Asia’s industrializing economies in the 1990s. Should it remain on this path, Iran’s population will evolve away from the politically volatile age structures plaguing neighboring Iraq, Syria and Saudi Arabia to the west and south, and Afghanistan and Pakistan to its north and east.

Demanding that women have more children is famously futile; even baby bonuses might not work. The demographic transition is well-implanted in Iran.

The authors go on to observe that Iran's demographic transition is most advanced in the most developed northwestern provinces, while the south and east of the country lags behind the national average. This RAND paper suggests that, to varying degrees, there are medical and educational inequities between provinces inhabited by ethnic Persians and provinces inhabited by non-ethnic Persians--Azeris, Kurds, Baluchis, and others--but these may reflect levels of development and don't seem to detract from a unified Iranian national identity.

It has been observed elsewhere that the Middle East and North Africa has the potential to benefit from a favourable demographic structure, with relatively large cohorts of young adults and relatively few elderly providing a high worker-to-population ratio. Certainly there will be an abundance of workers since there are huge pressures on Iranian labour markets: "By 2006, sixteen million Iranians in the 15-24 age group with be joining the working-age population. They will be replacing four million older Iranians who will presumably exit the potential labor force between 1996 and 2006 at the age of sixty."

Babak Pirouz' 2005 article in Business Week, "Iran: Perfect demography, lousy economy" makes the point that Iran's demographic structure, with a large number of working-age adults but relatively few dependents, could give Iran a huge economic advantage if adequately exploited. If.

Because of those years of pro-family social policy, however, Iran has a demographic profile that some development experts regard as a dream. The high birth rate of the 1980s created an enormous pool of young adults beginning to pour into the labor force. Meanwhile, those starting families have fewer children to support, because of the resurgence of birth control. That means new parents can spend more on personal consumption and their children's education. What's more, a big government investment in university training means many new workers are highly skilled. This looks like the smart, pro-growth policy that helped East Asia achieve dramatic growth from the 1970s through the '90s.

But Iran is no Taiwan or Singapore. The Shia Muslim nation's economy is so strangled by government control and regulation that it produces too few jobs to absorb all those college grads. In the past, experts say, most graduates got jobs with the government. But government agencies are saturated, and there aren't enough private jobs to employ all the would-be engineers and computer programmers pouring out of the schools. Indeed, most private enterprises in Iran are small businesses that employ 10 or less. The surfeit of educated young people represents "an immense opportunity for the country," says Hassan Taee, a professor of economics at Allameh Tabatabie University in Tehran and the ex-deputy head of Parliament's research center. But the economy isn't structured to take advantage of it.

This Population Reference Bureau blog entry makes the point that Iran's young adults, often discontented with the Islamic Republic's cultural norms and frequently economically and educationally deprived, subject to efforts by the clerical establishment to try restrict and regulate youth culture with the aim of socializing them in the Republic's norms, are unhappy and responding by emigration.

Whether Iran will manage to reap the benefits of its demographic dividend (having a large working-age population relative to the younger and older population groups who depend on the working-age population) all depends on how well its economy is equipped to create jobs for its rapidly expanding and mostly educated labor force. The youth unemployment rate (15 to 24 years old) stands at 23 percent, twice that of the total labor force. Finding a job is even more challenging for young women. One in three young Iranian women in the labor force (defined as either working or looking for a job) are unemployed. Young Iranians have been leaving the country in large numbers to find jobs in faraway places as Canada and Australia. The cost to the country for losing its human capital is estimated to be $40 billion a year.

And, one might add, by looking to street politics. The Islamic Republic seems relatively stable for now, but in the longer term, the current establishment's alienation of moderate conservatives and businessmen alongside Iran's baby-boom youth won't do good things for the system's viability. We'll see how Iran's demographics will interact with other social, economic, and political forces in the months and years ahead.