Her Choice participates in HLPF event about child marriage laws
The More Than Brides Alliance in collaboration with Girls Not Brides (GNB); the Global Partnership to End Child Marriage, Her Choice Alliance (HCA), and Partners for Law in Development (PLD) participated in a virtual side-event during the the United Nations 2020 High-Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development (HLPF).
Insecurity increases child marriage, and we expect that the COVID-19 pandemic will be no different: the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) estimates an additional 13 million child marriages will occur between 2020-2030 because of COVID-19.
Now more than ever ending child marriage needs to be on the global agenda. As COVID-19 limits on-the-ground programmatic activities, changing and enforcing minimum age at marriage laws may become a more feasible child marriage prevention approach. Bringing together a global panel of program and research experts, our overall objective for this event is to raise the issue of unintended consequences of the enforcement of child marriage laws in the context of COVID-19.
Panel virtual side-event
- Moderation: Esther de Vreede, Director Programme Implementation, Simavi
- Lucía Berro Pizzarossa, Girls Not Bride – UNINTENDED STIGMATISATION OF ADOLESCENT´S SEXUAL RIGHTS AS A RESULT OF CHILD MARRIAGE LAWS
- Madhu Mehra, Partners for Law in Development India – WHY GIRLS RUN AWAY TO MARRY: ADOLESCENT REALITIES AND SOCIO-LEGAL RESPONSES IN INDIA
- Gerald Kato, Her Choice – A PROGRAMMATIC VIEW ON ENDING CHILD MARRIAGES IN TIMES OF COVID-19 IN UGANDA
- AJ Melnikas, Population Council / MTBA – PERCEPTIONS OF CHILD MARRIAGE LAWS IN A CHANGING LEGAL CONTEXT: QUALITATIVE EVIDENCE FROM MALAWI.
