Children in Slovenia

In a quarter of a century the number of children dropped by a third
At the end of 2004 there were 286,678 children under the age of 15 living in Slovenia, which was 14.4% of total population. The fall in the number of children is the result of fewer births in recent years. In 1971 children under 15 represented a quarter of the population, while in 2004 their share was 10 percentage points lower. In this period the share of pre-school children dropped by a half and the share of elementary school children by 40%. Because the number of live births has been almost the same for the last five years (between 17,000 and 18,000), we expect that the number of pre-school children will, at least for a few years, remain unchanged.

Eurostat projection: in 2050 slightly fewer children in Slovenia than now
Low fertility, longer life span and a modest positive migration will continue to influence the number and age structure of the Slovene population. According to projections made by the Statistical Office of the European Communities (Eurostat), in Slovenia the share of children under 15 will fall from the present 14.5% to 13% in 2050 (the lowest share of children – only 12% – should be registered in 2039, while the share of pre-school children should stay about the same as in recent years, i.e. 5%.

From mid-2003 on the number of children is lower than the number of older people
The population of Slovenia is, as in other European countries, getting older. In Slovenia the ratio between children (0-15) and older people (65+) turned in favour of the latter in mid-2003. In the future the difference between the number of children and the number older people will increase.
The share of children is the lowest in Obalno-kraška region (12%) and the highest in Koroška region (almost 16%).

At the 2002 Census, 84% of children were living with both parents
At the 2002 Census, 99% of children were living with at least one parent; most of them (84%) lived with both parents. The probability that a child is living with both parents is increasing with the number of children. For example, at the 2002 Census only two thirds of single children were living with both parents, while 89% of children who have a brother or a sister were living with both parents and if there were three children in the family in 92% of cases they were living with both parents. Most parents of these children (83%) were married, while other children lived with unmarried parents. The probability that a child is living with unmarried parents is greatest at birth and then it decreases with the child’s age. Some unmarried couples eventually do get married.
At the 2002 Census, about 16% of children were living with only one parent, in most cases with the mother.

More than a half of children had a brother or a sister
At the 2002 Census, a fifth of children were living in families with at least two more children, less than a quarter of children had no siblings, and more than a half of children under 15 years of age were living with either a brother or a sister.
In non-urban settlements there are many more children with siblings than in urban settlements.

Italy and Bulgaria have the lowest share of children in Europe, while Albania has the highest
According to Council of Europe data, the share of children in European countries varies from 14.2% in Italy and Bulgaria to a third of total population in Albania. In Turkey too a third of the population are children, while in Island, Cyprus, Ireland and Norway children represent a fifth of the population.
Among countries of former Yugoslavia, Macedonia is the one with the highest share of children (20.4%), followed by Serbia and Montenegro with 19.5%. The lowest shares among these countries are in Croatia (16.6%) and Slovenia.

In the past ten year the number of child deaths was cut in half
In 2004, 113 children aged 0-14 died. About 60% of all child deaths happen before the child is one year old. The predominant reason is congenital abnormalities, chromosome abnormalities and situations arising from the prenatal period. As regards the infant mortality rate, i.e. the number of deaths of children under age 1 per 1,000 live births, Slovenia with its rate of 3.7 in 2004 ranks among countries with the lowest rate, which is traditionally characteristic for Scandinavian countries. In the past 40 years this coefficient fell from 30 to 3.7, which is a good indicator of the improvement in health care and the progress of the medical science.
Ten years ago 11 children per 100,000 died because of injuries which are the result of traffic accidents, falls, drowning, suicide or homicide, while in recent years the number has been under 5.

In their spare time children like to watch TV
According to data collected with the Time Use Survey, which was carried out in 2000-2001, children aged 10-14 sleep an hour more on weekends than on weekdays, when they sleep 9.5 hours. Every day they spend about half an hour to go to school and back, learn at school for slightly more than three hours and every weekday spend an hour and a half (girls) or ten minutes less (boys) on homework. Children spend most of their spare time (together slightly more than six hours per day) watching TV. Boys spend 10 minutes less than girls, who on average spend two and a half hours on a weekday and even more on a weekend. So there is not enough time to read books; girls read 17 minutes on a weekday, which is how much boys read on a Saturday and Sunday. On average, boys play an hour on a weekday and girls play an hour on Sundays (less during on a weekday). Girls practice sports for 45 minutes a day and boys half an hour more. We did not collect data on how much time per day people spend at the computer.