The Influence of Orphanhood on Children's Schooling and Labour: Evidence from Sub Saharan Africa

Does Orhpanhood affect Child Labour and School Attendance in Africa?

By: Guarcello L, Lyon S, Rosati F & Valdivia CA
Produced by: Understanding Children's Work (UCW), Innocenti Research Centre, 2004

This paper looks at whether orphanhood is linked to child labour and school attendance. It presents the extent and nature of the orphanhood phenomenon, including orphan rates, distribution of orphans by category (i.e., maternal, paternal or double), and orphans’ living arrangements; describes evidence of links between orphanhood and children’s time use, and in particular evidence of links between orphanhood, work involvement and school attendance; and examines orphanhood as a determinant of child labour and schooling decisions, based on estimation of a bivariate probit model. Findings from the study include:

• There is a clear causal link between orphanhood, on the one hand, and child labour and school drop-out, on the other. Therefore, orphanhood frequently forces children out of school, but not all are forced into work - some must enter economic activity or spend greater time on household chores, but others remain at home, outside of economic activity and school, presumably inactive
• The loss of one or both parents significantly raises the likelihood of child inactivity
• There is not a consistent pattern of poor orphans being more vulnerable to work than non-poor orphans. This argues for caution in using targeted income transfers as a policy prescription for reducing work among poor orphans.

The paper uses household survey data from 10 Sub Saharan Africa countries, and forms part of a broader effort to improve policy responses to the orphan crisis and to child vulnerability generally. It recommends that social protection and schooling policies need to be designed considering the specific country situation.