Gender of child: “no preference”, say Moroccan women

More than half of Moroccan women declare no preference for the sex of their desired child, according to the Haut-Commissariat au Plan (HCP).

“In Morocco, it is difficult to generalize that there is no preference for a child’s sex, as attitudes and practices can vary according to region, socio-economic background, level of education and cultural tradition. However, from the 2000s onwards, it seems that preference for a specific sex of child is no longer widespread in Morocco”, notes the HCP in the latest issue of its publication “Brefs du Plan”, entitled “Préférence relative au sexe de l’enfant au Maroc: Désir de répartition équilibrée et penchant vers la descendance féminine”.

Indeed, according to the report on the results of the ENSME-1997 (national survey on mother and child health), “preference for the male sex is not really a priority for the women surveyed, as it was in the past”, stresses the HCP, noting, in this sense, that almost half of married women wishing to have a child in the future declared no preference as to the sex of this child.

What’s more, this indifference to the child’s gender has seen an increase, from 49% in 1997 to 54.4% in 2018 (National Population and Family Health Survey), claims the same source.

In detail, indifference as to the sex of the desired child has increased in urban areas, rising, according to the HCP, from 44.6% in 1997 to 52.2% in 2018, with a consequent drop in preference for male offspring, from 25.6% to 19%, and a slight decline in preference for female offspring, from 29.8% to 28.8% over the same period.

In rural areas, gender indifference increased from 52.7% in 1997 to 57.2% in 2018, and preference for boys fell from 26.4% to 19.5% over the same period.

With regard to women who have declared a preference as to the sex of the desired child, the HCP observes a neutrality with regard to the child’s sexual identity, noting that in 1997, 26% of Moroccan women wanted to have a boy, while 25% wanted a girl, while in 2018, 26.4% of women wanted to have a girl, against 19.2% leaning towards a boy.

For rural women, the preference for girls has increased from 20.9% in 1997 to 23.3% in 2018. For urban women, the preference for girls over boys has strengthened over time (29.8% versus 25.6% in 1997, and 28.8% versus 19% in 2018).

In addition, the HCP explains that women’s preferences as to the sex of their child may vary according to their fertility history, noting that indifference to the sex of the desired child is higher among women with the same number of boys and girls, and among women with no children at all.

Indifference as to the choice of sex of the desired child among childless women has, however, fallen slightly, from 84% in 1997 to 82.5% in 2018, resulting from a drop in urban areas from 82.8% to 78.4% and an increase in rural areas from 84.8% to 88.3% over the same period.

For women with the same number of boys as girls, this indifference rose from 79% in 1997 to 86.5% in 2018, accompanied by an increase in urban areas from 79.2% to 85.1% and in rural areas from 78.9% to 88% over the same period.

For women with same-sex children, indifference to the choice of the child’s sex is lower. This indifference is negatively correlated with the number of same-sex children. Indifference in choosing the sex of the desired child is higher among women with only girls than among those with only boys.

In addition, the HCP reveals that the preference to have an additional female child is prioritized as the number of boys increases among the number of living children, and the preference to have a boy is prioritized as the number of girls increases among the number of living children.

Thus, Moroccan women who have expressed a preference for the sex of their desired child tend to want one child of each sex, or a balanced distribution of their children by sex, since they take into account the sex of children already born when formulating their preferences for the sex of the desired child.