Demographic trends in peninsular Malaysia, 1947-75.

Abstract

Peninsular Malaysia, like a number of smaller countries in Asia, is midway along the path of demographic transition. After World War II, immigration to Peninsular Malaysia was severely limited, and natural increase became the primary source of population growth. With high birth rates and rapidly declining mortality in the late 1940s and 1950s, population growth rates rose to 3% per annum. Fertility levels began to decline in the late 1950s, and the downward trend continued throughout the 1960s and the first half of the 1970s. Ethnic differentials in trends are explored, and possible implications of the trends for socioeconomic development are suggested.-Author