The number of teenage girls giving birth in the Bay of Plenty has dropped to a 13-year low but is still the third highest in the country, new figures show.
The proportion of all Bay of Plenty births to teenage mothers was 8.9 per cent in 2013, research by the Social Policy Evaluation and Research Unit (Superu), formerly the Families Commission, has revealed.
Despite the drop, the Bay of Plenty had the third-highest regional birth rate in the country in 2013, behind Gisborne with 10.4 per cent and Northland with 10 per cent.
The region also ranked second in the proportion of mothers aged 17 years or younger, among all 2013 mothers.
"The highest proportion of births to younger teenage mothers aged 17 years or less are in the predominantly rural regions of Gisborne (32.3 per cent) and Bay of Plenty (31.3 per cent)," the report stated.
Of that 31.3 per cent, 18 per cent were aged 17, 10.5 per cent were 16 and 2.8 per cent were under 16.
Eighteen-year-olds accounted for 27.9 per cent of teenage mothers, and 40.1 per cent were aged 19.
The last recorded figures in 2006 showed 10.7 per cent of Bay of Plenty mothers were under 20, up from 9.4 per cent in 2001.
Family Planning national medical adviser Christine Roke said new initiatives could be having an impact on the number of teenage mothers.
The "fit and forget" contraceptive implant, Jadelle, was subsidised in 2010 and had proved popular, often working more effectively than a contraceptive pill because it did not depend on the user's memory to take it, Ms Roke said.
"We've been putting in a large number of those across the country ... I think that's making a marked difference."
A non-invasive abortion option was also made available in 2013 for women in the first nine weeks of pregnancy which also may have had an impact, she said.
She expected the number of teenage mothers would be lower in Tauranga than other, more rural, areas of the Bay of Plenty because girls had easier access to a wider range of services in the city.
Tauranga Hospital Midwifery manager Esther Mackay said the the report reflected what they had been experiencing, "with an anecdotal view that rural communities have higher numbers of teenage pregnancy than urban communities, as the report suggests".
"Factors which may influence this are access to contraception and family planning services and the cost of transport."
However, Tauranga's Pregnancy Choice Centre director, Janice Tetley-Jones, said despite the figures she had noticed an increase in teenage mothers since they opened in October, 2013, particularly in girls under 17.
"I think that's great that teenage pregnancy has dropped, but it's not something we've experienced ourselves [in Tauranga]."
She wondered whether the increase was due to more people hearing about their services, but noticed more girls were choosing to keep their babies.
"Of late we've had more wanting to keep their babies than having an abortion.
"We've had some saying what they thought was the worst thing has turned out to be the best thing that's ever happened to them."
The recent decrease seen in the Bay of Plenty from 2006 to 2013 reflected a nationwide drop, with the national teen birth rate dropping to the lowest level recorded, at 5.9 per cent.
However, New Zealand's teenage birth rate was still high for a developed country.
"We are second only to the USA in the latest figures, but the numbers are heading down, which is the right direction," Clare Ward, Superu chief executive, said.
"The evidence shows us that teen births are associated with poor educational and social outcomes for some teen parents and their children, so it's encouraging that the percentage of teen births is decreasing."