The total fertility rate (TFR) in Iran should reach 2.1 to make up for the significantly low rates in the past decade(s), Muhammad Esmaeili Motlaq, head of the Health Ministry’s Population, Family and Health Office said Monday.
“Currently, the TFR is 1.9, posing a challenge to the national population growth rate,” he said at a conference on population policies at the University of Medical Sciences in Alborz Province, IRNA reported.
In 2012 the TFR was 1.92 and in 2014 1.85. Sistan-Baluchistan Province, an underdeveloped and relatively poor and desolate region in the southeast, has the highest fertility rate at 2.
Motlaq added that raising awareness among couples on the consequences of having one child, as well as long spacing between the first and second child, are among the ministry’s plans to boost TFR to 2.1.
