Literature Review on Early Child Marriage

Child marriage is regarded as a violation of human rights by United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) as it restricts education and future prospects for adolescent girls. The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 5.3 also mandated elimination of child marriage as one of its targets by 2030.

Despite relentless efforts by the Government of Bangladesh (GoB) and all other relevant non-government actors, the problem of child marriage has escaped solutions with tenacity. The latest Demographic and Health Survey (2014) showed that the prevalence of child marriage in Bangladesh is around 59% (BDHS 2014).

A desk review titled “Early child marriage in Bangladesh: causes and consequences” is issued by Share-Net Bangladesh secretariat and is funded by Share-Net International in the Netherlands. This was written by Ishrat Jahan, Gazi Sakir Mohammad Pritom and Rushdia Ahmed at the Center for Gender, Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights (CGSRHR) at BRAC James P Grant School of Public Health (BRAC JPGSPH), BRAC University.

This review aims to give a comprehensive idea on the status of child marriage in Bangladesh and to provide an overall picture of the causes and consequences including related legal and policy frameworks in the country. The methodology was informed by the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines [Moher et al., 2009]. Finally, 56 relevant peer reviewed articles were included for qualitative synthesis for this desk review (see Annex-Matrix).

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