The link between child marriage in Pakistan and… climate change

Get married early to "escape the storm"

Saima was just 15 when she was married off last summer to a man twice her age in the Dadu district of southern Pakistan’s Sindh province. The wedding took place just before the monsoon season, which brought torrential rains and flooding.

A child marriage in Pakistan, where the bride is under 18 and the groom is almost twice her age. Photo: GI

The Sami family fears a repeat of the situation in 2022, when record-breaking rains and floods submerged a third of Pakistan, displacing millions of people and destroying crops.

Another young woman, Saima, had her family displaced by the 2022 storm and flood disaster, and her father, a farmer named Allah Bukhsh, lost his livelihood.

Unable to support his family, Mr. Bukhsh decided to marry Saima in exchange for 200,000 Pakistani rupees ($720).

"We want to escape the rain and the misery in the refugee camps. This is not easy," Mr. Bukhsh explained when interviewed by German television station DW.

Saima said she was initially happy to get married but “it wasn’t as easy as I expected”. The now 16-year-old gave birth this year. “My responsibilities have doubled.”

Survival Marriages

Child marriage is widespread in many parts of Pakistan. The South Asian country has the sixth highest number of girls married before the age of 18 in the world , according to government figures released in December.

The legal age of marriage varies from 16 to 18 in different parts of Pakistan, but the law is rarely strictly enforced.

Against this backdrop, human rights groups say extreme weather events are increasingly taking a toll on the future of Pakistani girls.

The future of many Pakistani girls is under threat as many families choose to marry them off early to earn some money. Photo: DW

“There were 45 cases of child marriage registered in Dadu last year but I believe there could be dozens more that went unregistered,” said Niaz Ahmed Chandio, coordinator of the NGO Child Rights Committee.

Activists say in these cases, marriage is often about survival, as desperate families look for ways to get by.

Mashooque Birhmani, founder of the NGO SUJAG SANSAR, which works with religious scholars to combat child marriage in Pakistan, said poverty and displacement from floods forced families to marry off their daughters in exchange for money.

“These are survival marriages prompted by the monsoon season and the reason behind marrying off a daughter is to reduce the cost of feeding the family during a climate disaster,” said SUJAG SANSAR.

Osama Malik, a lawyer based in Islamabad, echoed the sentiment. “The floods of recent years have been devastating, destroying crops and forcing poor farmers to marry off their daughters as soon as they reach puberty,” Malik said.

Extreme weather resonates with patriarchal society

The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) said Pakistan has made "significant progress" in reducing child marriage over the past two decades. However, UNICEF noted that the country has been significantly affected by the impacts of climate change, such as the devastating floods of 2022.

“There is evidence that extreme weather events like this are associated with increased risk of child marriage,” UNICEF said in a report following the historic floods two years ago. “In a year of this magnitude, we would expect to see an 18% increase in child marriage in Pakistan, equivalent to erasing five years of progress.”

Pakistani children are vulnerable to climate change and extreme weather. Photo: DW

Amid such a backdrop, Pakistan's patriarchal society further aggravates the problem.

“In large families, girls are often seen as a burden and will soon be abandoned,” said Afia Salam, a journalist specializing in environmental and gender issues in Pakistan.

Early marriage often leaves girls facing early motherhood and lifelong reproductive health problems. They also have no education or employment prospects, making them vulnerable and completely dependent on their families for survival.

Therefore, Mr. Niaz Ahmed Chandio, coordinator of the Commission on the Rights of the Child in Pakistan, said that parents and local communities must be more educated about the dangers of child marriage and its impact on the lives of girls.

“Strengthening and enforcing laws and social protection measures from the government and aid groups are key to solving the problem,” said Mr Chandio.

Quang Anh

Source: https://www.congluan.vn/moi-lien-he-giua-nan-tao-hon-o-pakistan-va-bien-doi-khi-hau-post310637.html