orphan is defined as a child whose mother is reported deceased but whose father is reported to be alive, and a paternal orphan is a child whose father is reported deceased but whose mother is reported to be alive. Double orphans are those with both parents reported deceased.<sup>9</sup> The small percentage of children for whom the survival status of one or both parents is missing is excluded from the analysis (see Annex Table). In 12 out of 42 country and year data sets, more than 2 percent (but less than 4 percent) report unknown status of either parent or other parents.

Living arrangements are categorized based on two main variables collected about a child. First is whether or not a child’s mother and/or father are residents of the same household as the child. Second is the child’s relationship to the head of the household.<sup>10</sup> Where a parent co-resides with a child, but that parent is not the head of the household, the co-residence status is given precedence in categorization of living arrangement of the child. Relationship to household head is an imperfect measure of the true quantity of interest, namely the relationship between caregiver and child, which is expected to be more closely associated with child development. Due to data limitations, however, the primary caregiver of children can not be directly identified. Based on parent co-residence and the relationship to head of the household, the set of mutually exclusive categories for child living arrangements are: living with mother only, living with father only, living with both parents, household head is grandparent, household head is an “other relative”, and “unrelated to household head”. In the more recent DHS questionnaires (e.g. Zimbabwe 2005 and Cote d’Ivoire 2005), a separate category for niece/nephew (by blood or by marriage) was added as a specified relationship to the household head. Based on data from those countries, fully two-thirds of “other relatives” are aunts and uncles of the children. This is consistent with evidence from other surveys.<sup>11</sup> Since the data do not include information on both “receiving” and “sending” households for children who are fostered, only characteristics of the current residence of children (“receiving” households) are available to understand the process of child fostering—for orphans

> 9 These survey data provide so-called “direct” estimates of the number of orphans in these countries, whereas an alternative would be to use estimates from mathematical models produced by UNAIDS and others. There are in some cases large gaps between these sets of statistics. Robertson et al. (2008) discuss the underlying factors that might explain this gap, one of which is an underestimate of maternal orphans due to foster mothers reporting themselves as biological mothers.

> 10 There are extremely few children under 15 who were themselves reported to be head of their household, or spouse of the household head. They are not included in this analysis of living arrangements.

> 11 Evidence from elsewhere suggest that aunts and uncles may be an even larger share of this group. In the 2004/05 Integrated Household Survey from Malawi, 75% of “other relative” caregivers for children under 15 were aunts or uncles. Others note that the traditional safety net for orphans in Africa has been aunts and uncles (Foster 2000).

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