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Indigenous fertility in the Northern Territory of Australia: what do we know? (and what can we know?)

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Abstract

In the Northern Territory of Australia, Indigenous people make up 30% of the population. Demographic features of the Indigenous population are thus important for understanding Northern Territory population dynamics, but our understanding of what is happening within the Indigenous population is limited by poor data and limited research attention. This paper exploits birth registration and census data to explore Northern Territory Indigenous fertility trends over a 20-year period. It investigates whether fertility decline identified for the 1960 and 1970s is a contemporary feature of Indigenous fertility in the Northern Territory. Results show that our understanding of Northern Territory Indigenous fertility is heavily constrained by data and that trend analysis is essential for avoiding erroneous conclusions because of annual fluctuations. The outstanding feature of Indigenous fertility in the Northern Territory is women becoming mothers at extremely early ages, particularly in rural and remote parts of the Territory. Age patterns appear to have changed little since the middle of last century despite modest declines in age-specific fertility at the youngest ages. While these declines may continue, any trends will be slow to emerge. Continued close scrutiny of data sources and monitoring of trends is needed to ensure that Northern Territory population dynamics are properly understood, and care must be taken in interpreting results to make certain policy interventions aimed at population outcomes are appropriate and achievable.

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Notes

  1. The term ‘Indigenous’ is used throughout this essay to refer to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island populations. While the author recognizes that this can be a contested term it is used in the context of defining a population constructed from a diverse group of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island peoples. Where peoples, rather than populations, are referred to the terms ‘Aboriginal’ and ‘Torres Strait Islander’ are used.

  2. One of the current policy initiatives of the Northern Territory Government is ‘Territory Growth Towns’, aimed at transforming 20 Indigenous communities into ‘proper towns’ (Northern Territory Government 2009). Two-thirds of the Indigenous population of the Northern Territory lives in rural and remote communities (ABS 2008c) and this policy priority is part of a broader suite of policies aimed at Indigenous employment in urban, rural and remote settings.

  3. Indigenous vital registration data are not published by the Australian Bureau of Statistics unless they are assessed as being at least 90% accurate (ABS 1994). Perinatal data accuracy can be inferred from hospital audits of patients’ Indigenous status (as most Indigenous women give birth in one of the five public hospitals in the Northern Territory). Hospital audits in 1997 and 2008 found 94 and 97% agreement respectively between patient admission details and self-reported Indigenous status recorded in an interview (Condon et al. 1998; Tew et al. 2008).

  4. In the Northern Territory, most births to Indigenous mothers are registered within three months of occurrence. In 2005 and 2006, for example, only 0.3% of births to Indigenous mothers usually resident in the Northern Territory were for births that occurred over a year before registration (ABS 2007b).

  5. A report based on the 2006 perinatal data has been released by the Department of Health and Families (Tew and Zhang 2010) which shows a TFR of 2.4 births per Indigenous woman in the Northern Territory. Data by five year age group have not been published or made available to the author for inclusion here.

  6. This difference in trend lines between rates based on the two datasets is still in evidence when data for 1988–2005 only are used. The difference cannot be attributed to the different years for which data are available for the two time series.

  7. Three-year rolling averages were calculated to try and minimize the impact of the annual fluctuations but the same upward and downward trends remained in evidence, so it was decided to present annual rates for comparison with other results presented here.

  8. Results presented in Fig. 2 suggest this difference may be due to higher birth counts at the older ages in the vital registration data compared to the perinatal data. Johnstone (2009) found no evidence to support this possibility, but it cannot be ruled out without much more detailed investigation of the data sources. A key issue is that the two data sources give a slightly different ‘fertility story’ for Indigenous women in the Northern Territory. Most Northern Territory government policy is informed by analysis of the perinatal data (Northern Territory Treasury 2009; Tew and Zhang 2010), which if used in isolation may not provide the most robust evidence base for policy decisions.

  9. To place the results below in context, New Zealand Maori in 1986 had 19% of the TFR contributed to by women under the age of 20 years (Jackson et al. 1994).

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Acknowledgments

This research is supported by an ANU PhD Scholarship, the Australian Population Association J.C. Caldwell and Alan Gray Grants, and a Northern Territory History Grant from the Northern Territory Government. Thank you to Dr Rebecca Kippen for feedback on an earlier version of this paper, and detailed comments from two anonymous referees. Thanks also to Drs Nick Parr and Fei Guo, who as judges of the 2009 W.D. Borrie Prize (postgraduate) selected this essay as the winner, thus providing the impetus for its submission to the Journal. Any contestable claims or errors are my own.

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    Kim Johnstone

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Johnstone, K. Indigenous fertility in the Northern Territory of Australia: what do we know? (and what can we know?). J Pop Research 27, 169–192 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12546-011-9048-3

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