Evaluation of the Pearsonian Type I Curve of Fertility by Age of Women of Aboriginal Identity Groups in Canada, 1996-2001

Ravi B.P. Verma, Statistics Canada
Shirley Loh, Statistics Canada

In 2005, Statistics Canada published new projections of the Aboriginal Populations (North American Indians, Métis and Inuit) in Canada, Provinces and Territories: 2001 to 2017. To derive the number of births in these projections, the age-specific fertility rates were simulated by fitting the Pearsonian Type I curve using the fertility parameters: total fertility rates, mean and modal ages of fertility. These parameters were estimated for 2001 by the own-children method using data on children aged 0-4 and women within the age groups, 15-49 from the 2001 Census of Canada. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the goodness of fit between the age-specific fertility rates developed by the Type I curve and the estimated age-specific fertility rates for Aboriginal identity groups for the period 1996-2001 at the Canada level and two fertility regions. Tests of validity of the Type I curve will be addressed in the paper.