Eurostat released the report "Being young in Europe today" which consists of various data on children in Europe aged up to 15 and young people aged between 15 and 29.
Data collected for 2013 shows that young people in Croatia remain the longest in the parental household, with an average age of 31.9, ahead of Slovakia (30.7), Malta (30.1), and Italy (29.9).
At the opposite end of the scale are the countries where young people leave home earliest: at 19.6 years in Sweden, 21.0 years in Denmark and 21.9 years in Finland. They were followed by the Netherlands (23.5), France (23.6) and Germany (23.9).
Data for 2014 indicates that Ireland has the highest share of children aged under 15 in the total population, 22.0%, while the lowest share of young people was observed in Germany (13.1%). In Croatia, there were 628,000 children under 15, or 14.8% of the total population.
According to demographic forecasts, by 2050 Croatia could have 521,000 children aged under 15, which would be a share of 13.9% of the total population.
The number of children aged under 15 could increase in 9 EU countries - Belgium, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Slovenia and Sweden.