Collinson Mark A, Tollman Stephen M, Kahn Kathleen
MRC/Wits Rural Public Health and Health Transitions Research Unit (Agincourt), School of Public Health, University of Witwatersrand, South Africa.
Scand J Public Health Suppl. 2007 Aug;69:77-84. doi: 10.1080/14034950701356401.
World population growth will be increasingly concentrated in the urban areas of the developing world; however, some scholars caution against the oversimplification of African urbanization noting that there may be "counter-urbanization" and a prevailing pattern of circular rural-urban migration. The aim of the paper is to examine the ongoing urban transition in South Africa in the post-apartheid period, and to consider the health and social policy implications of prevailing migration patterns.
Two data sets were analysed, namely the South African national census of 2001 and the Agincourt health and demographic surveillance system. A settlement-type transition matrix was constructed on the national data to show how patterns of settlement have changed in a five-year period. Using the sub-district data, permanent and temporary migration was characterized, providing migration rates by age and sex, and showing the distribution of origins and destinations.
The comparison of national and sub-district data highlight the following features: urban population growth, particularly in metropolitan areas, resulting from permanent and temporary migration; prevailing patterns of temporary, circular migration, and a changing gender balance in this form of migration; stepwise urbanization; and return migration from urban to rural areas.
Policy concerns include: rural poverty exacerbated by labour migration; explosive conditions for the transmission of HIV; labour migrants returning to die in rural areas; and the challenges for health information created by chronically ill migrants returning to rural areas to convalesce. Lastly, suggestions are made on how to address the dearth of relevant population information for policy-making in the fields of migration, settlement change and health.
世界人口增长将越来越集中在发展中世界的城市地区；然而，一些学者告诫不要对非洲城市化进行过度简化，指出可能存在“逆城市化”以及农村与城市之间普遍的循环迁移模式。本文旨在研究后种族隔离时期南非正在进行的城市转型，并探讨当前迁移模式对健康和社会政策的影响。
分析了两个数据集，即2001年南非全国人口普查数据和阿金库尔健康与人口监测系统数据。根据全国数据构建了一个定居类型转变矩阵，以展示五年内定居模式是如何变化的。利用分区数据，对永久和临时迁移进行了特征描述，给出了按年龄和性别的迁移率，并展示了迁移的来源地和目的地分布。
全国数据与分区数据的比较突出了以下特征：由于永久和临时迁移导致城市人口增长，特别是在大都市地区；普遍存在的临时循环迁移模式，以及这种迁移形式中不断变化的性别平衡；逐步城市化；以及从城市向农村地区的返乡迁移。
政策关注点包括：劳动力迁移加剧农村贫困；艾滋病毒传播的爆炸性条件；劳动力移民返回农村地区死亡；以及慢性病移民返回农村地区康复给健康信息带来的挑战。最后，针对如何解决迁移、定居变化和健康领域政策制定中相关人口信息匮乏的问题提出了建议。
