CHILD MARRIAGE LAWS AND DATA.

The laws which protect children from child marriage are different in every country. In many countries, even if one law makes child marriage illegal, there may be another law which allows exceptions to this. This makes it very confusing for children to understand their rights, and difficult to implement strong child protection measures.

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We have created a database of child marriage laws in 132 countries and territories where child marriage data is available.

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The information provided includes:

• the rates of child marriage for girls and for boys (and the source and year of this data)

• the laws which relate to child marriage in the country

• any exceptions to the laws

• the legal age for marriage in each country

• the age at which exceptions to the law allow children to marry in practice

• any laws which prevent or enable girls who are married or pregnant to stay in school

• context about the country which might make child marriage more prevalent, such as whether or not it is affected by conflict or climate disaster impacts, or multidimensional poverty (a measure which assesses access to public services like healthcare, education, and sanitation, as well as levels of economic poverty).​