Child Poverty in Mozambique. A Situation and Trend ... - Unicef

Dependency ratios, estimated by dividing the number of children of 0 – 14 years of
age plus the number of those who are 65 and above by the “active” population of 15
– 64 years, were estimated in 2006 at 71.6 per cent and 92.1 per cent for urban and
rural areas respectively, with an overall national ratio of 85.2 per cent (INE).
The AIDS pandemic is having a dramatic demographic impact. The latest round of
sentinel surveillance data produced a national HIV prevalence estimate for 2004 of
16.2 per cent among people between 15 and 49 years of age (Ministry of Health,
2005). 10 The worst affected region of the country is the central region with an
estimated prevalence of 20.4 per cent, while the southern region has a rate of 18.1
per cent and the northern region has a rate of 9.3 per cent. 11 Sofala province is by far
the most affected, with 26.5 per cent HIV prevalence recorded in 2004.
Based on HIV/AIDS estimates from the 2002 surveillance round, projections of
the future impact of the epidemic to 2010 suggest that life expectancy at birth is
presently 37.1 years and will decline to 35.9 years by 2010 (Multisectoral Technical
Group for the Fight against HIV/AIDS, 2004). 12 Projections also indicate that there
will be around half a million fewer children in the 0 to 14 age range than INE figures
suggest by 2010 (see Figure 2.3) and that the AIDS pandemic will be responsible for
626,000 orphans by the year 2010, compared with 64,000 in 1998 and 382,000 in
2006.
Figure 2.3: Projected age structure of the population in 2010: comparing INE and
Multisectoral group figures (in millions)
4.0
3.5
3.0
2.5
2.0
1.5
1.0
0.5
0.0
0-4 5-9 10-14 15-19 20-24 25-29 30-34 35-39 40-44 45-49 50-54 55-59 60-64 65-69 70-74 75-79 80+
INE Projection
Multi Sectoral Group Projection
Source: INE 2004a and Multisectoral Technical Group for the Fight against HIV/AIDS 2004
8 The data presented here are drawn from INE (2004a) unless otherwise stated. United Nations Population Division (2006) “Medium variant”
projections for Mozambique are also used. See Klasen and Woltermann (2004) for a detailed discussion of the two somewhat different sets of
projections. The analysis presented here also draws on this article.
9 Calculation based on total land area of 786,380 km2 (INE, 2006).
10 Estimates based on a network of 36 ante-natal care sentinel sites. While the national sero-surveillance network is regarded as a relatively
strong one (Garcia-Calleja et al., 2004), there are well recognised concerns about the accuracy of the national prevalence estimates (Arnaldo and
Francisco, 2004).
11 The central region comprises Sofala, Manica, Tete and Zambezia (42.1% of the population in 2006) while the southern region comprises
Maputo City, Maputo Province, Gaza and Inhambane (25.5% of the population in 2006) and the northern region comprises Niassa, Nampula and
Cabo Delgado (32.4% of the population in 2006).
12 Life-expectancy at birth projection significantly varies from the latest population projection data produced by INE based on the 2003 DHS,
which indicates that in 2006 life expectancy at birth was 45.9 in rural areas and 51 years in urban areas, or a national average of about 47.4 years.
The implementation of the population census in 2007 will clarify these differences and help better understand the demographic impact of AIDS.
CHILDHOOD POVERTY IN MOZAMBIQUE: A SITUATION AND TRENDS ANALYSIS
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