Provisional fertility rates for the year 2003 indicate that New Zealand women average 1.96 births per woman. This figure is about 7 percent below the level required by any population to replace itself without migration (2.10 births per woman). Sub-replacement fertility is a feature of most developed countries, including Australia (1.7 births per woman), Canada (1.6), Denmark (1.7), England and Wales (1.7), France (1.9), the Netherlands (1.7) and Sweden (1.6), but not the United States (2.12 in 2001). The comparatively high rate in New Zealand reflects the higher fertility rates of Māori (2.55 births per woman in 2003) and Pacific women (2.94 in 2000-02), who make up a fifth (22 percent) of women in the reproductive ages.
Since 1992, the median age of women giving birth has risen from 28 to 30 years (half were older, half were younger). The median age of Māori women giving birth is younger but is also increasing (from 25 years in 1996 to 26 years in 2003).
New Zealand has a relatively high rate of childbearing at young ages compared with other developed countries, but the trend has been downward in recent years. The birth rate for young adolescents under 18 years was 18.0 per 1,000 females aged 15-17 years in 1996 and 14.8 per 1,000 in 2003. The rate for young Māori is higher but has fallen faster over the same period (from 48.3 to 39.4 births per 1,000 15–17-year-old females). The birth rate for Pacific females under 18 years declined from 28.2 to 22.9 per 1,000 between 1996 and 2001.4
