An increasing number of children in the Netherlands is growing up in broken homes, and children with unmarried parents are more likely to see them separate, the national statistics office CBS said on Tuesday.

In total, three in ten 15-year-olds grow up in a household with only one parent, the CBS said. Twenty years ago, the figure was two in ten.

Some 53,000 children were confronted with parents who split up in 2016. Of them, 20,000 came from families in which the parents were not married, the CBS said.

Around a quarter of couples who break up opt to share childcare, and children split each week or month between both parents. However, in 70% of separations, children remain living with their mother.

Unmarried couples are most likely to separate before a child starts primary school at the age of four. The divorce rate among married couples rises until a child reaches the age of six, and then drops slowly, the CBS said.