Why Child Marriage Is Still Prevalent?

Child marriage is a prevalent issue, with girls being more likely to be wed as children than boys. Between 2000 and 2018, 86% of minors wed were girls, according to data from Unchained. Despite legal minimum age laws in most countries, it remains prevalent in many places. Factors leading to child or forced marriage include financial or food insecurity, cultural or social norms, and the belief that girls and women are inferior to boys and men.

Child marriage is rooted in gender inequality and the belief that girls and women are inferior to boys and men. It is made worse by poverty, lack of education, and limited access to education and healthcare. Child marriage is often associated with developing countries, such as sub-Saharan Africa, where on average, 40% of women marry before age 18. In South Asia, on average, 30% of women marry before age 18.

Child marriage refers to any formal or informal union between a child under the age of 18 and an adult or another child. Despite a steady decline in this harmful practice over the past decade, child marriage remains widespread, with approximately one in five girls married in childhood across the globe.

The roots of child marriage vary across countries and cultures, but poverty, lack of educational opportunities, and limited access to healthcare perpetuate it. Some families marry off their daughters to reduce their economic burden or earn income. Three main forces driving child marriages are poverty, the need to reinforce social ties, and the belief that it offers protection.

Should child marriage be banned around the world?

“For many, Valentines Day is associated with romance, flowers and marriage proposals,” said Henrietta Fore, UNICEF Executive Director. “Yet for millions of girls around the world, marriage is not a choice but an unwelcome end to their childhood and future. The solution is simple: Ban child marriage, invest in education, and empower young people, families and communities to bring about positive change. Only then will we end this devastating practice by 2030 and protect the 150 million girls at risk.”

• Worldwide, an estimated 650 million girls and women alive today were married before their 18th birthday.
• Globally, the total number of girls married in childhood is estimated at 12 million per year.
• South Asia is home to the largest number of child brides with more than 40 per cent of the global burden (285 million or 44 percent of the global total), followed by sub-Saharan Africa (115 million or 18 percent of the global total).
• The practice of child marriage has declined around the world. In the past decade, the proportion of women who were married as children decreased by 15 per cent, from 1 in 4 (25%) to approximately 1 in 5 (21%), thats around 25 million child marriages that have been prevented. Increasing rates of girls education, proactive government investments in adolescent girls, and strong public messaging around the illegality of child marriage and the harm it causes are among the reasons for the shift.
• In South Asia, a girls risk of marrying in childhood has declined by more than a third, from nearly 50 per cent a decade ago to 30 per cent today, largely driven by great strides in reducing the prevalence of child marriage in India.
• Increasingly, the global burden of child marriage is shifting from South Asia to Sub-Saharan Africa, due to both slower progress and a growing population. Of the most recently married child brides, close to 1 in 3 are now in sub-Saharan Africa, compared to 1 in 7 25 years ago.
• In Latin America and the Caribbean, there is no evidence of progress at all, with levels of child marriage as high as they were 25 years ago.
• Child marriage occurs in high-income countries too. In the United States, the majority of all 50 States have an exception in law that allows children to marry before the age of 18. As of 2017, in the European Union, only four countries tolerate no exceptions to the minimum age of 18 for marriage.
• Marrying in childhood has repercussions across many areas of a girls life. For example, in Ethiopia, the majority of young women who married in childhood gave birth before their 20th birthday and child brides were less likely to receive skilled care during their last pregnancy and delivery. In addition, married adolescent girls in Ethiopia are three times more likely to be out of school than their unmarried peers.
• In order to eliminate child marriage by 2030 as set out in the Agenda for Sustainable Development, global progress would need to be 12 times faster than the rate observed over the past decade.

UNICEF is working to end child marriage in 64 countries globally. Click here to donate to UNICEFs work to #EndChildMarriage.

What are the factors associated with child marriage?

The major drivers of child marriage have been conceptualized as follows: poverty and economic factors; lack of opportunity for girls beyond marriage; fear of pregnancy/girls sexuality; social norms; and a lack of agencies among girls themselves 1, 13, 18, 20,21,22. Literature has shown that girls who marry early aremore likely to experience violence, abuse, and forced sexual relationsbecause of unequal power relations 23,24,25. Young girls are also more vulnerable to sexually transmitted infections (including HIV) 26,27,28. Girls education, health, and psychologic well-being of females, as well as the health of their offspring, are all negatively impacted by child marriage 29.

Most existing research seeking to explain why child marriage persists has focused on understanding how factors manifest at the individual and household levels. In recent years, there has also been a growing interest in understanding and changing drivers that sustain the practice at the community level 22, 25. However, few studies have explored how the drivers of child marriage manifest across both micro (individual and household) and macro (community) levels, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) 21, 30, 31. Understanding the intersection of drivers across levels and to what extent drivers work separately or jointly to sustain the practice is critical for designing and implementing effective policies and programs aimed at preventing child marriage. However, we are still learning about factors that influence early marital decision making, particularly about girls beliefs and circumstances and about the social context in which they live 32,33,34.

Even though literature shows that the environment has a significant impact on marital and reproductive health behaviour of young individuals, mainly due to peer pressure and other social factors, no study has attempted to examine both individual and community level factors associated with child marriage in Zambia. An earlier study by Mulenga and others 35, conducted in Zambia found that residence, age at first sex, education level of women and their partners, and family size had a significant influence on prevalence of child marriage. The study, however, ignored the influence of community-level factors on child marriage. There is a paucity of knowledge on how community-level factors influence early marriage in Zambia. In view of this, we conducted this study to bridge the knowledge gap that exists in the literature. Examining both individual and community-level factors associated with child marriage is an important step to inform relevant government and non-governmental organizations to have an in-depth understanding of factors that explain why girls fall into a trap of child marriages in Zambia.

Where is child marriage most common?

In West Africa, Niger has the highest rateof child marriage globally — 76% of girls in Niger are married before the age of 18. Other countries in sub-Saharan Africa, like the Central African Republic and Chad, also see more than half of all girls married before their 18th birthday.

How are poverty and child marriage connected?. For parents with several children or families living in extreme poverty, child marriage is simply a way to helpalleviate their desperate economic situation.

In communities where a girls family pays a dowry, marriage at a younger age can mean a lower expense. In other communities, the economic transaction is reversed, and a man will pay a bride price to the parents of a girl to marry her. In these communities, younger girls often fetch a higher price, since they presumably have more time to dedicate to their new family and bear more children.

What country is child marriage most common?

Niger has the highest child marriage rate in the world among girls. According to the most recent data, in this West African country, more than three fourths of girls aged under 18 were married, with nearly 30 percent of them being younger than 15 years old. The Central African Republic, Chad, and Mali followed behind with rates ranging from 61 to 54 percent. This issue is globally spread, particularly in African countries. In many of these countries, the legal age to get married is lower for females than for males. In Niger and Chad, for instance, the legal age is 15 years for females and 18 for males. In Guinea, instead, the legal age for marriage is 17 for females and 18 for males. Child marriage is often related to poverty, with poor families choosing to marry away their girls both in order to earn money as a wedding gift and as this means fewer mouths to feed.

Why is child marriage still prevalent in India?

Gender discrimination: Gender discrimination in Indian society encourages child marriage. The social status of women is often linked to marriage and motherhood. So girls are married off at a young age.

What are the factors responsible for child marriage in India?. Poverty, lack of education, gender inequality, tradition and religion are the main factors for child marriage in India. Parents think it will reduce family expenses, and girls will be protected.

What are the consequences of child marriage?. Child marriage leads to health risks for girls, high infant and maternal mortality, low literacy and skill levels, domestic violence and child sexual abuse. It severely impacts the growth and development of girls.

Who is punished for child marriage?. The childs parents and guardian, the person conducting the marriage, and anyone abetting or promoting child marriage can be punished under the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006.

What religion has the most child marriages?

The table clearly shows that prevalence of child brides among the Hindus is greater than the child brides among all the religions. For the rest of the religions, the incidence of child brides is lesser as compared to the overall average, except for Muslims and Buddhists in the urban areas.

Which country has the lowest marriage age?

Similarly, in Equatorial Guinea and São Tomé and Principe, children can marry at the age of 14 with their parents consent but have to wait until they are 18 otherwise.

There are a considerably high number of countries that allow children to marry at the age of 15 and 16 as long as their legal guardians sign off on it. However, the majority of nations across the globe have 18 as their minimum barrier for marriage without parental consent.

There are also a handful of countries that have set their minimum legal marriage age higher than 18. Below are the countries that require individuals to be 21 years old before they can get legally married.

• Botswana
• Burundi
• Cameroon
• Chad
• Eswatini
• Gabon
• Guinea
• Ivory Coast
• Lesotho
• Namibia
• Niger
• Rwanda
• Zambia

Why is child marriage so prevalent in West Africa?

Gender inequality, along with poverty, are among the main drivers of the issue, with marriage delivering expectations of better social status and financial aid for both underage girls and their parents.

Why is child marriage still legal in America?

Congress has set some limits on child marriage, but because marriage is regulated at the state level, the United States has no national law banning child marriage and no national minimum age to marry. Several states have recently revived debates about child marriage; earlier this year, Michigan banned the practice. But many more states need to take action.

David French: How to fix Americas child-pornography crisis.

Child marriage can deprive children—mostly girls—of agency and put them in abusive situations. In most states, a man who has sex with an underage girl in circumstances that would typically qualify as statutory rape can avoid the charge if he is married to the minor, with some exceptions. In some instances, child-custody rulings can be upended if a child marries with the permission of a noncustodial parent. And in most cases of child marriage, the minor does not technically have the legal standing to initiate a divorce until they are 18 (unless a judge decides otherwise in a prior hearing), and may not be allowed to stay in domestic-violence shelters because they are not an adult.

What country has the youngest marriage age?

In one country (Sudan) boys may be married at 10, in one they may be married at 13 (Lebanon), in one they may be married at 15 (Iran), and in six they may be married at 16 or 17 (see Figure 3). Under customary and religious law, as under other minimum marriage age laws, girls are less protected than boys.

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• Taylor & Francis Open Select
• PMC6382347

The marriage of children below 18 is widely recognized in international human rights agreements as a discriminatory global practice that hinders the development and well-being of hundreds of millions of girls. Using a new global policy database, we analyze national legislation regarding minimum marriage age, exceptions permitting marriage at earlier ages, and gender disparities in laws. While our longitudinal data indicate improvements in frequencies of countries with legal provisions that prohibit marriage below the age of 18, important gaps remain in eliminating legal exceptions and gender discrimination.

KEYWORDS: Child marriage, early marriage, minimum marriage age, gender discrimination, gender inequality, comparative law, marriage law, family law, child rights, cross-national analysis, international treaties, conventions.

Why is child marriage still prevalent in South Africa?

Various factors and practices contribute to a situation where the countrys child marriage rates are arguably much higher than reported. First, there is no minimum age of marriage in the context of religious marriages, for these marriages are not recognised as valid under South African law.