Indicators of disadvantaged children:
the case of Roma children
Leonardo Menchini – UNICEF Innocenti Research Centre
INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY FOR CHILD INDICATORS
Inaugural Conference
Chicago, 26-28 June 2007
Background
• In 1992 the UNICEF ICDC (IRC) started the MONEE PROJECT
“Public Policies and Social Conditions: Monitoring the Transition in
Central and Eastern Europe and the CIS”, releasing each year the
TransMONEE database
• Innocenti Social Monitor 2006 “Understanding child poverty in SouthEastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States”:
need of a new approach in monitoring the conditions of children in
CEE/CIS
• 2007: project MONEE 15 (new challenges in monitoring the condition
of children in CEE/CIS) and project “Making children visible in routine
surveys”
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The situation of Roma children in Central and Eastern
Europe
• Poverty among Roma is one of the most pressing issues in the countries of
Central and Eastern Europe
• In most of the countries of this region, extreme poverty and deprivation are
concentrated in Roma population. Roma benefited only marginally of the
recent period of (sustained) economic growth: their relative position
compared to the other groups of the population deteriorated.
• Children represent a large share of the Roma population, and they are
particularly vulnerable to poverty and different kinds of material and
immaterial deprivation.
• In order to develop policies that target the most disadvantaged groups of
Roma children, a comprehensive knowledge of the situation of these children
is necessary.
• Lack of data hampers the understanding of the situation of Roma people and
Roma population.
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Some data on Roma children disadvantage /1
Bulgaria, 2001 – Distribution of children across
expenditure deciles, by ethnic group
100
90
Extreme income poverty rate
(under 2.15$PPP) in Bulgaria
2001:
ROMA children: 49%
80
Bulgarian children: 2%
70
60
Roma children represented
two third of the total number
of children living in extreme
poverty.
Roma (18 per cent of all children)
50
Turk (10 per cent)
40
Bulgarian (70 per cent)
30
They represented 18% of the
total child population
20
10
0
Poorest
2nd
3rd
4th
5th
6th
7th
8th
9th
Richest
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Some data on Roma children disadvantage /2
Health and education
Serbia - 2005
• Infant mortality for Roma in Roma settlement
• Infant mortality – total Serbia
•
•
•
•
•
25 per thousand (MICS 2005)
8 per thousand (WHO 2005)
Bulgaria – 2001 LSMS
Basic school attendance rate of Roma children 7-14
Basic school attendance rate of non Roma children 7-14
Upper secondary (15-17) attendance – Roma
Upper secondary (15-17) attendance – non Roma
75%
97%
35%
90%
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Some data on Roma children disadvantage /3
Romania Poor children and Rroma children between 8-16 years who are not in school (per cent)
In total non-poor
In total poor
1995
4.5
19.1
1996
4.2
17.1
1997
3.1
13.7
1998
2.8
12.2
1999
3.1
12.3
2000
2.3
11.1
2001
2.6
12.8
2002
2.5
12.6
2003
2.4
14.2
2004
2.9
13.2
In total non-Roma
In total Roma
7.6
44.2
6.3
35.7
5.1
41.9
4.6
36.6
5.4
32.9
4.6
36.2
4.8
36.2
4.8
33.6
4.8
31.3
4.3
25.7
Roma children are over-represented in Special Needs Schools in Slovakia
Nationality
Share of children in
Special schools %
Slovak
85.5
Romani
7.6
Hungarian
6.7
Czech, Moravian, Silesian
0.2
Placement in special needs
schools is used in some locations
as a mean of segregating Roma
children in education
Source: MoE Slovakia
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Some data on Roma children disadvantage /4
Housing /Serbia 2003 Living conditions in Roma settlements
Type of dwelling
Apartment in a
building
2
Average usable area of dw elling (m 2 per capita)
26
R o m a s e t t le m e nt s
A v e ra ge po pula t io n
16.0
House
14
A space not intended
for living
1
Base: children population
Roma
settlements
General
population
16.4
13.9
84
73
20.0
17.6
11.9
9.4
7.0
To tal
6.1
5.5
1. quintile
2. quintile
6.6
3. quintile
7.6
4. quintile
5. quintile
HH co nsumtio n o f Ro ma settlement
base: children po pulatio n
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Some data on Roma children disadvantage /5
Housing type – Slovakia – UNDP report
Housing type
Roma Households
Households of general
population in nearby
areas
Individual brick house
50.3%
72.7%
Apartment in a new
house
18.3%
18.6%
Wooden house
5%
0.3%
Housing built from
different materials
(shack)
12.1%
0.3%
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Very few data on Roma and Roma children
are available in CEE countries
• Research and analysis on the situation of Roma children are
hampered by the lack of data or representative data. Lack of
adequate monitoring.
• Lack of data seriously hamper the ability of the states to target,
implement and monitor measures to improve the living conditions of
Roma and combat discrimination.
• The difficulty starts from the lack of reliable data on the size of the
Roma population – a huge difference exists between official data and
other estimates.
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Estimates of the Roma population
Roma people represent between 1 to 10 percent of the population of the CEE countries, but a
larger share of the child population
early 2000s
Roma population (official data)
number
% of total population
Albania
1261
0.04
Bosnia and Herzegovina
8864
0.23
Bulgaria
370908
4.68
Croatia
9463
0.21
Czech Republic
11746
0.11
Hungary
189984
1.9
FYR Macedonia
53978
2.69
Moldova
12900
0.38
Montenegro
2601
0.43
Romania
535140
2.5
Serbia
108193
1.44
Slovakia
89920
1.67
Slovenia
3246
0.16
Roma population (alternative estimates
number
% of total population
90-100,000
3.1
40-50,000
1.2
500-800,000
8.7
30-40,000
0.8
175-200,000
1.8
520-650,000
5.9
135,500
6.8
20-25,000
0.7
13,500
2
1,800-2,000,000
8.8
450-500,000
6.3
480-520,000
9.3
8-10,000
0.5
Data from Open Society Institute, 2006
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Extremely different population structures between Roma
and other groups of the population
Serbia 2005
Roma in Serbia 2005
70–74
70–74
females
60–64
60–64 males
50–54
50–54
age group
age group
males
40–44
30–34
40–44
30–34
20–24
20–24
10–14
10–14
0–4
0–4
10
8
6
4
2
0
2
per cent
4
6
8
10
females
10
8
6
4
2
0
2
4
6
8 10
per cent
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The demographic differences
• Bulgaria - 2001
• Roma represent 7% of the total population
• But Roma children account for 18 per cent of all children
• Household size – non Roma
• Household size – Roma
2.8 members
4.8 members (5.6 if only hh with children)
• Only 24% of Roma households do not include children (66% of nonRoma hh do not include children)
• Circa 40 per cent of Roma population were under 18 year old.
(children represent less than 20 per cent of the tot. pop. in Bulgaria)
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Data collection issues
Official estimates are mainly based on Censuses. Censuses collect
information on ethnicity based on self-identification. But only a limited
share of Roma people identify themselves as Roma (in part for fear of
discrimination).
• Many governments refuse to include Roma as a category for census
purposes. Most of the data collected for administrative purposes do
not include disaggregation by ethnic groups.
• When administrative data include information on nationality, they are
based on self-identification (in Slovakia, labeling administrative
records about Roma was frequent in the past – administrative
labeling creates potential discriminatory misuse of collected data and
grossly violated individual rights)
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Alternatives to data disaggregated by
ethnicity?
• The alternative to ethnic disaggregated data could be the use of nonethnical categories to identify the more disadvantaged group of the
child population (for example children living in large families, children
whose parents are jobless etc.)
• This alternative can work only if there is no ethnic dimension in
connection with child deprivation, discrimination and segragation.
• This is not the case of Roma children, where ethnicity is connected
with discrimination and social exclusion (for example discrimination in
access to basic social services, access to benefits, participation to the
labour force, school and housing segregation etc.)
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Data collection on ethnicity – self declaration
• Self-declaration of ethnicity is a fundamental right issue
• The reasons for declaring a distinct ethnicity are in a continuum going
from undeveloped ethnic awareness to fears of discrimination.
• At least some Roma people do not identify themselves with the Roma
minority and, at least in part, they wish to be as close as possible to
the majority population.
• There is a patchwork of various Roma group defined differently by
cultural criteria, heritage and level of integration. Moreover, multiple
identity (ethnicity, nationality, citizenship…)
• Combination of ethnic, socio-economic, behavioural and outsider
identification markers
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Conclusion
• Inclusion of a question on ethnicity in sample surveys
• Roma over-sampling in surveys to obtain representative results
• Involvement of Roma communities in the data collection process (in
particular for censuses)
• Support Roma self-identification of ethnicity (protecting against
discrimination), respecting the wishes of Roma as to the designation
they want to be given.
• issue of birth registration – possession of document for access to
social services – but not labeling
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