Namibia's Orphans

The Situation in the country:

Namibia is a large (825,418 km²) and sparsely populated (2,103,761) country on Africa's south-west coast. It is a lower middle income country (MIC), with an annual average per capita income of around US$ 1,800. But with the relatively small population, 62 % live on less than US$ 2 a day (49 % live below the international poverty line, currently US$ 1.25 a day) (1).

Namibia ranks among the most AIDS affected in the world with a prevalence of 17.7 % (2). The estimated total of people living with a positive status is 212,000, of whom 14,400 are children (0-14 years) (3). Children are not only infected themselves, the pandemic also leaves them orphaned and vulnerable.

An orphan is a child who has lost one or both parents because of death and is under the age of 18 years (4). Vulnerable is a child who needs care and protection (5). The common term for orphans and vulnerable children is OVC.

According to different sources, Namibia has between 200,000 and 230,000 OVC, of whom between 110,000 to 141,000 are orphans. This represents about 28 % of all children under the age of 18 (6).  

The Government and civil society in Namibia agreed on seven service areas that are vital to OVC. Those services are: Food and nutrition, Education and vocational training, Psycho-social support, Health, Economic strengthening, Child protection (including legal services) and Shelter and Care (7). 

The purpose of the standards is to encourage organisations and programmes (such as the Church Alliance for Orphans) to gauge and improve the quality of the services they offer to vulnerable children and their families and also track outcomes. It requires the cooperation of Ministries, NGOs, clinics, schools and OVC projects to reach the goal of making a change in children’s lives.

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• MGECW: Data records grant payments. Database contains more than 111,000 children and caregivers. Children must be registered as orphans to be enrolled in the grant system.
• Ministry of Education (MoE): The ministry performs a yearly survey of primary and secondary learners enrolled in public and private schools (stored in a large database called EMIS). The database only includes children enrolled in school.
• Demographic Health Study (2006- 2007): The DHS carried out a large-scale research project. 28 field teams interviewed about 9,200 households, 9,800 women and 3,900 men (between 15 and 49 years of age)