Supportive socio-economic conditions to achieve a successful demographic dividend in South Africa

Abstract

One of the population structures associated with demographic dividend is “demographic transition”, which is a shift from high fertility and mortality to low fertility and mortality. It is understood that low dependency ratio (shows that there are relatively more adults of working age who can support the young and the old of the populace) is one major factor in achieving a successful demographic dividend (DD) (Esther, 2013). DD refers to the fast-economic growth that is achieved by a country when there are dependency ratios. This definition means that the proportion of people of working age group (15-64) is higher, compared to those of ages lower than 15 and above 64 years (Statistics SA, 2017).