UN agencies welcome African-led push to end child marriage

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Thanks for beginning this discussion however I won't be commenting as I need to remain impartial.

It should be filed as some crime in the law if it was done. So, everyone would stop it seriously if it was said strictly.

Madagascar thinks that this is a very simplistic view and not at all realistic. Just because something is illegal, doesn't stop people doing it. Whilst making child marriage illegal in each country would be a start, attitudes need to change and education must take place.

In Madagascar, most rural marriages are 'traditional', and are not legalised by the state - merely recognised by their local village. This means that anything legal is very hard to enforce. Many girls get married at 13-14-15. For rural folk, education has usually stopped by this age - particularly for girls - as continuing on to lycée means having to leave the village and live in a larger town during the week. Most families can't afford to send all of their children on to lycée. And they are often concerned that girls who leave, will be unsupervised and may get pregnant young before they are married. Therefore the usual pattern in rural villages is for girls to be married around the age of 14 - often an arranged marriage.

Madagascar is trying to tackle this by educating families about the health risks to girls who become pregnant very early. Obstetric fistula is a huge problem in Madagascar, resulting from young girls who have not fully developed, trying to give birth in rural villages without any medical help. The baby is too large for the pelvis, and by the time people realise that she has an obstructed labour and walk to the nearest hospital - often many hours or even days away - the baby has died and the girl has significant injuries including incontinence and is often shunned by her family. Madagascar is also trying to promote the value of continued education. Together, hopefully changing attitudes towards child marriage and educating about the dangers of early childbirth, will reduce the number of girls getting married at 13 and 14 in Madagascar.

Ok, I agree but the council should take the necessary steps or at least provide good and free education to the village because some people cannot also afford to pay the costs for education. They have to be given free or affordable education and also the morals and needs of life and about the child marriage.
They should be told the defects by child marriage.
Minor marriage as the girls won't be much matured physically. They may if they give birth at childhood give unhealthy babies and at such a minor age the children do not understand the true meaning of life but just get together with ho understanding as they are not enough matured.
Councils should be created to explain the defects of child birth and make them understand it is not the right way to marry.
But councils can and should go to each village and explain the drawbacks of child marriage.In this way they should be understanding the truth.
: 1) Empower girls with information, skills and support networks; 2) Provide economic support and incentives to girls and their families; 3) Educate and rally parents and community members; 4) Enhance girls' access to a high-quality education; and 5) Encourage supportive laws and policies. In order for the next generation of development programs to make ending child marriage a priority, policymakers must pay attention to these strategies while continuing to test innovative approaches and evaluation techniques.

Madagascar agrees with many of these sentiments, however wishes point out the reality of a developing country where 75% of our population live in rural villages with few amenities. Whilst free education to baccalaureate level for all young people would be good, the reality is that there is not funding for this. Furthermore, Madagascar struggles to encourage enough primary school teachers to work in these rural areas - never mind considering secondary education. Even if hypothetically, lycée education were free, it is not feasible to have lycées in rural villages, and therefore young people would be obliged to travel to towns to study during the week - and many parents do not have the money to pay for board and lodging and travel for a child away from home - particularly when average families have 6-8 children. Likewise 'economic support to girls and families' - where would this money come from?

Empowering girls - how do you suggest this could be done? Particularly in a culture where men are seen as the dominant gender and girls are often married off in arranged marriages at a young age when they are not able to refuse, as they are not financially independent and have nowhere else to go / no alternative. Empowerment and economic support etc are nice buzz-words, but in this sort of rural, poor society, buzz words are not enough. Funding is not available at whim, and we value concrete, workable solutions rather than abstract ideas.

Madagascar feels that educating village and community leaders is part of the way forward - where cultural changes need to occur, these can only come from the people advising the people. Madagascar is committed to trying to change cultural perceptions concerning marriage at 13-15. However, in this culture and environment, we feel that marriage at 16+ is reasonable, and trying to fight against it would not be possible.

Botswana feels we are still in a good standing with our law. By allowing marriages from 16 with parental consent, we feel this is in line with tradition whilst protecting very young girls. We strictly enforce this law and we feel we don't need to modify it, because all marriages have to be registered, whether it is religious or customary law. Arranged marriages is rare thing to find and is usually found in some rural areas. Forced child marriages are scarce and seem to be isolated cases. If anything we feel we are making waves in curbing these human rights violations. So we feel we don't need to increase the age limit and anger some of the more conservative members of the public.

OOC: We need to keep the rural vote.

Whilst parents are still living for the young girls, the young girls are protected!
Girls who are less in age are not matured. They are not fit for marriage which means they cannot register marriage at such ages.

Depends on your perspective what you call mature. Maturity doesn't necessarily mean being the age of 18
Especially in developing countries like ours. There are children that are naturally more mature because of their situation. And we have said before it's how you implement the law not necessarily the law itself. So it's good and well to say we are going to amend our law to and say we're going to protect the young girls but which country can actually have the figures to prove it. A law isn't going to change arranged marriages just delay them, or stop under age marriage. That comes through changing the mindset of the people something we have committed years in doing so. Also it's about modernizing your economy to allow employment of both sexes in secondary and tertiary institutions. This prevents a mentality reliant on subsidence farming and cattle rearing which has a knock on effect on children's education especially girls.

Changing our law isn't going to change of what we have accomplished which other African nations dream of. It should be about overall commitment to protect the rights of children.