Children constitute 26.9 percent of Turkey’s population

* Photo: Anadolu Agency (AA)

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The Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat), producing official statistics on Turkey, has released its "Statistics on Child for 2021" today (April 20).

According to the Address Based Population Registration System (ABPRS) results cited by the TurkStat, while Turkey's population was 84 million 680 thousand 273 people by the end of 2021, 22 million 738 thousand 300 of this number was constituted by the child population.

51.3 percent of the child population was boys and 48.7 percent was girls. While the child population, which includes the 0-17 age group according to the definition of the UN, constituted 48.5 percent of the population in 1970, this rate was 41.8 percent in 1990 and 26.9 in 2021.

The proportion of child population

According to the TurkStat data, while the labor force participation rate of the children aged 15-17 was 16.2 in 2020, this rate increased to 16.4 percent in 2021. The recent statistics have also shown that the net enrollment rate of 5-year-olds also declined in a year.

CLICK - Child labor rate in 15-17 age group: 16.2 percent

Other highlights from the report are as follows:

Cities with highest, lowest proportion of children

According to ABPRS results, when the proportion of child population in the total population was analyzed by provinces, the province with the highest proportion of child population was Urfa with 45.2 percent in 2021. It was followed by Şırnak with 42.3 percent and Ağrı with 40.1 percent.

According to the TurkStat, the province with the lowest proportion of child population in Turkey was Tunceli with 17.3 percent. It was followed by Edirne with 17.8 percent and Kırklareli with 18.4 percent.

The most popular names

According to the results of the ABPRS, the most popular names given to newborn baby boys were Yusuf, Alparslan and Miraç, the most popular girl names were Zeynep, Elif and Asel in 2021.

In Turkey, it was seen that the most popular boy names were Yusuf, Mustafa and Mehmet, the most popular girl names were Zeynep, Elif and Yağmur for the children in the 0-17 age group in 2021.

Net enrollment rates of children

According to the formal education statistics of the Ministry of National Education, while the net enrollment rate of 5-year-olds was 71.2 percent in the 2019/'20 educational year, it was 56.9 percent in the 2020/'21 educational year. When the net enrolment rate of 5-year-olds was analyzed by sex, this rate was 57.4 percent for boys and 56.3 percent for girls.

While the net enrollment rate at primary school level was 93.2 percent, the net enrollment rate at lower secondary school level was 88.9 percent and the net enrollment rate at upper secondary school level was 87.9 percent in Turkey in the 2020/21 educational year.

Internet usage among children

According to the survey on information and communication technology usage by children, while the Internet usage rate was 50.8 percent in 2013 for children aged 6-15, it became 82.7 percent in 2021.

When Internet usage was analyzed by sex; it was seen that Internet usage rate of boys increased to 83.9 percent in 2021, which was 53.7 percent in 2013, and Internet usage rate of girls increased to 81.5 percent in 2021, which was 47.8 percent in 2013.

In the activities carried out through the Internet by children aged 6-15 using the Internet regularly, participation in online classes with 86.2 percent took the first place, while using the Internet for homework or learning with 83.6 percent took the second place in 2021.

This was followed by playing or downloading games with 66.1 percent, watching videos from sharing sites with 61.0 percent, making calls (including video calls) over the Internet with 55.5 percent. The least activity of children on the Internet was online shopping with 9.1 percent.

31.3 percent of children using the Internet regularly used the Internet for social media: Social media usage was on average of 2 hours 54 minutes a day for weekdays and 2 hours 44 minutes a day for weekends.

Legal child marriages for girls decreased

According to marriage statistics, while the proportion of legal child marriages for girls aged 16-17 within the total legal marriages was 7.3 percent in 2002, it decreased to 2.3 percent in 2021. On the other hand, while the proportion of legal child marriages for boys at the same ages in the total legal marriages was 0.5 percent in 2002, it was 0.1 percent in 2021.

Labor force participation rate for children

According to the results of Household Labor Force Survey 2021, the labor force participation rate at the age group of 15-17 was 16.4 percent.

Last year, this rate was 16.2 percent.

When the labour force participation rate was analyzed by sex, it was seen that this rate was 22.9 percent for boys, and 9.5 percent for girls.

Road traffic accidents

According to road traffic accident statistics; 15.3 percent of traffic accidents in 2020 resulted in death or injury. While a total of 4 thousand 866 people lost their lives in these accidents, 430 of them were children.

Considering age groups, it was seen that 46 percent of the children who died were in the 0-9 age group, 25.1 percent were in the 10-14 age group and 28.8 percent were in the 15-17 age group. (AÖ/SD)

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