[Analysis--of family-planning in urban low-income brackets based on Daejon and Daegu Cities]

Since the inception of the national family planning program in 1962, the main emphasis has been placed on the provision of contraceptive services and information, education, and communication (IEC) activities through home visits by family planning field workers and through government designated private physicians. This approach has been a powerful management system for the national program, particularly in the rural area. However, new issues in the national family planning program emerged with the subsequent socioeconomic changes since 1962. An increasing number of the rural population began to migrate to the urban area, and, therefore, beginning in the 1970s, more weight had to be given to the family planning service for the urban area; in particular, for those in the low-income brackets. In an effort to increase contraceptive acceptors among the urban low-income people, the government has implemented various special projects for them since 1974, through maximum utilization of community leaders including Tong and Ban Chiefs and mothers' clubs, and family planning workers in their areas. Thus, this paper analyzes the current status of family planning and fertility behavior of urban low-income wives as a part of program evaluation. Also, this paper is based on an analysis of the 1984 Family Planning Survey data, which was conducted in July 1984 and responded to by 600 married women aged 15-44 in the low-income areas of the Daejon and Daegu cities. The survey data revealed that the contraceptive practice rate was 77.0%, which was much higher than 70.3% of the national practice rate in the same year, and the approval rate for the 1 or 2 children of the low-income areas was much higher than that of other urban areas. Based on the results of the analysis, the following recommendations are suggested for the better program implementation: 1) improvement of program management system for recruiting new acceptors in their 20s for birth spacing; 2) development and inducement of innovative incentive schemes and IEC activities for increasing the proportion of the 1 child families; and 3) strengthening the utilization of community resources including mothers' clubs.