Reasons for High Crude Birth Rates at the Beginning of the Demographic Transition than at the End - Assignment Example

The model follows four basic stages. Birth and death rates decline as the population moves from the first to the fourth level while the total population increases. This essay wants to discuss what causes this drop in birth and death rates.

To begin with, there is a high Crude Birth Rate (CBR) at the beginning because at this stage the population is facing so many problems. There is a high fertility rate that allows people to have as many children as they want because culture or religion allows them. Besides, these children are a source of labor in households. In addition, most of the people do not even know or practice family planning since such facilities are not available or the people are ignorant. Again, people tend to have many children because they are afraid that some of the children may due to hunger or diseases that are prevalent since health facilities are not well developed. Because of that people have to bear more children to beat the Crude Death Rate. However, as the population’s economy, education, food, and health conditions improve, according to Rodrigue (2012) and the University of Michigan (2006), Crude Birth Rate starts decreasing in stages two, three; and is very low in stage four where a country is now highly developed. In stage four, people opt for very small families because of the rising costs and health conditions are so good that deaths are minimized.

In addition, Crude Death Rate (CDR) is also very high at the beginning because of problems such as poor diets, health services, and education, which are highly characteristic in a developing (pre-industrial) country. As such, people tend to bear more children to try to cover for the losses they get through deaths. However, as health services and facilities; food quantities and quality together with economy improve, Crude Death Rates start decreasing in stages two and three until they become very low in the fourth stage, where a country attains industrialized status just like Crossman (2014) and Rodrigue (2012) agree.

The points above clearly show that the population of any place will have very high birth rates and death rates at the beginning since the country is undergoing a transition to a more developed country; where birth rates and deaths rate are both very low. In developed countries, conditions are good and life is expensive to feed many children, hence people avoid having very big families.