Until now, we simply added pairs of data to an associative array.  Now, we shall examine how to delete pairs of data from an existing associative array. 

Let us consider the following code:

declare
      type year_type is table of number index by binary_integer;
      year_profits      year_type;
      tot_profits number := 0;
      i           number;
begin
      year_profits(1990) := 34000;
      year_profits(1991) := -45000;
      year_profits(1992) := 43000;
      year_profits(1996) := -13000;
      year_profits(1998) := 53000;

      i := year_profits.first;
      while i <= year_profits.last
      loop
            if year_profits(i) < 0 then
                  year_profits.delete(i);
            end if;
            i := year_profits.next(i);
      end loop;

      i := year_profits.first;
      while i <= year_profits.last
      loop
            tot_profits := tot_profits + year_profits(i);
            i := year_profits.next(i);
      end loop;
      dbms_output.put_line('Total profits: ' || tot_profits);
      dbms_output.put_line('No. of years in profit: ' ||
year_profits.count);

end;

The highlighted part checks for any negative numbers within the values available in the associative array.  If anything is found, it gets deleted automatically using the DELETE member (which is also pre-defined).

In the next section, we shall examine how to delete more than one element at a time.