Women in 30s account for rise in birth rate

Canada recorded its highest number of births in seven years in 2005, thanks mostly to women in their 30s, Statistics Canada reported Friday.

Canada's total fertility rate in 2005 was 1.54 children per woman, an increase from 1.53 in the previous year and the highest rate since 1998. This is still well below what is known as the replacement level fertility which is about 2.1 children per woman.

In total, 342,176 babies were born in 2005, up 1.5 per cent from the previous year. In 2005, the number of births was the highest since 1998, when 342,418 babies were born in Canada.

Women aged 30 to 34 had the highest proportion of births in 2005, accounting for 107,524, or 31.4 per cent of total births. Women aged 25 to 29 in 2005 represented 30.9 per cent of all births, while those born to women aged 35 to 39 accounted for 14.5 per cent of all births.

Over the last 15 years, there has been a shift in the age groups with the highest birth rates. In 1995 and 2000, it was women aged between 25 to 29 who were having the most babies. Then, in 2005, women aged 25 to 29 and those aged 30 to 34 began to share the highest rates.

The average age of women giving birth has risen steadily in the last 25 years. In 2005, the average age was 29.2 years. That compares with 25.9 years in 1980.

At the same time, birth rates have been declining among teenage girls almost steadily since 1991. In 2005, the birth rate for girls aged 15 to 19 was 13.4 children per 1,000.

Teen fertility rates declined in all provinces except Alberta, where the rate rose slightly from 18.8 per 1,000 women in 2004 to 18.9 in 2005.

Rising birth rates

The number of births dropped to a 55-year low in 2000; since then, the number of births has gone up every year except 2002. As of 2001, most babies were born to parents belonging to the echo generation (the children of baby boomers), who were already in their prime childbearing years.

In 1947, the nation's total fertility rate was 3.6 children per woman, the highest level since 1921. At the height of the baby boom in 1959, the number of annual births exceeded 479,000, the highest level since comparable Canada-wide vital statistics were first compiled in 1921.

The annual number of births remained high for a few more years, then dropped sharply starting in 1964. This period of relatively low births, known as the baby bust, lasted about 10 years until the mid-1970s.

The first echo of the baby boom generation was expected in the mid-1970s, approximately 25 years after the beginning of the baby boom, when the mean age of a mother would have been 25 years old. But with the exception of 1974 and 1975, the rises were relatively modest.

It was not until the late 1980s, from 1988 to 1990, when there was a substantial increase in the number of births, followed by decreases until the year 2000.