According to UNICEF some 60 million children are forced to enter into marriages before they are of legal age, half of which are in South Asia. While countries in South America, Africa and Asia may have the highest numbers of early and forced marriages, more than 2 million young girls in Europe are also child brides. Ten million girls under the age of 18 years-old are married each year, and governments must do more to address this global concern, the group Plan UK says in a report.
“Why is the international community so silent when so many girls are forced to marry when they are still children?” asks Plan’s chief executive in the UK, Marie Staunton.“Now is the time to act of this abuse of human rights – marriage often spells the end of a girl’s education. She’s also less likely to send her own children to school – perpetuating the poverty cycle. “Child marriage is a practice embedded in many cultures and traditions – all too often it also increases after humanitarian disasters.” (Plan UK)
Why are childhood marriages so common and desired? There are a multitude of reasons that societies continue to practice early marriage and feel the benefits out way any undesirable consequences. For example if a girl is married young her virginity is more likely to be guarantee, but the main reason is that with early marriage come increased economic and social benefits. A wedding in a rural community is a great source of joy and pride for a family, especially the family of the bride, for they can now see that their child is cared for and has a future. Marriage is also of social importance, as the family receives a great standing in the community, based on the family of the groom or bride. Economically the families of the bride additionally benefit with the increase in social status and having one less mouth to feed, and often benefit from a dowry. In rural agricultural societies once families are joined they often pull their resources together to increase their output and probabilities.
The report Breaking Vows: Early and Forced Marriage and Girls’ Education, highlights that one girl is married off every three-and-a-half seconds across the globe. While looking at countries such as Niger, Mali and Chad where 70% of girls are married early the report illisrates how most will become pregnant soon after their marriages begin only to face many more challenges as they struggle through pregnancy for which they are not physically or mentally prepared — manny will unfrotunatly loose their own life or that of their childs during child birth. The report also places focuse on the life-long health complications that child marriage places girls in, including putting them at greater risk for contracting HIV/AIDS.
Despite these shocking statistics the topic of child marriage has become somewhat taboo, to many it is nothingness than unimaginable, but this unspeakable practice while outdated is alive and well in many cultures across the globe. Therefore Plan UK’s report is seeking the British government, and that of other global leaders and states, to place more emphasis to combat child marriage and forced marriages across the globe. Plan UK is calling for the issue to be placed on the international agenda, to implement cross-government actions plans to combat forced and early marriage, to prioritize international developpment programs to place emphasis on those programs and actors who seek to see that girls education is the emphasis in an effort to curb and elimnate child marriage in additon to providing support services for girls seeking an escape from early or forced marriages.
Please see my other posts on child marriage here.
