Abstract
An attempt has been made to know the impact of family planning on fertility in India through the Prevalence Model. If prevalence levels of both programme and non-programme contraception are known, this technique permits the estimation of gross natural and potential fertility for assessing births averted. With the emergence of the National Family Health Survey (NFHS) to monitor family planning and health activities, this method becomes a useful tool. Of special, interest is the ability of the procedure to yield estimates by age group as well as by type of contraceptive method used.
In the study, the standard method-specific use-effectiveness levels weight observed use and prevalence level by method are observed. Of the total births averted in India by programme contraception 87 percent of births were averted by sterilization users in 1998-99 while the spacing methods users contributed to only 13 per cent of the birth prevention. The birth prevention by spacing methods in urban areas is more than two folds of the birth prevention by spacing methods in rural areas (10 percent). The spacing methods need to be strengthen for the greater use. With regard to the births averted by non-programme contraception, the main contribution was made by the users of periodic abstinence of 56 percent, which was followed by the users of withdrawal of 37 percent and by the other methods of 7 percent. Of the total birth averted in India, the contribution of programme contraception and non-programme contraception is about 89 percent and 11 percent in 1998-99. The programme contraception has dominance role to control fertility however the non-programme contraception use should also be enhanced at the places where accessibility of programme contraception is poor.