Changing the behavior of ethnic minorities in marriage

Women's Union of Vinh O commune, Vinh Linh district propagates prevention of child marriage to every household - Photo: TCL

In 2023, the whole province had 3,344 marriages, of which 331 were child marriages, accounting for 9.9%. Although the number of child marriages has tended to decrease, the situation of child marriage and consanguineous marriage (CNCHT) in ethnic minority areas in the province is still complicated, concentrated in Dakrong and Huong Hoa districts. Through annual investigation and review by the Dakrong District Medical Center, the number of child marriages in 2023 in the district was 62 cases, in the first 6 months of 2024, 35 cases occurred.

There are many reasons why the rate of children in ethnic minority areas getting married early is high. The main reason is the isolated lifestyle in remote areas and the influence of outdated customs, practices, and concepts in marriage and family. Many people misunderstand the custom of "going sim", so many girls and boys who have not fully developed physically, mentally, and have experience as a wife, husband, father, or mother have to get married early because they are pregnant. Moreover, people's awareness is still low and they lack knowledge about how to educate their children, leading to a situation where they learn negatively from social networks, leading to a free lifestyle and unwanted pregnancies before reaching the legal age of marriage.

Implementing Project 8 “Achieving gender equality and resolving urgent issues for women and children”, in recent times, the Women’s Unions at all levels in the province have increased propaganda, consultation and intervention activities integrated with programs, projects and models of reproductive health care (RH), maternal and child health, population and family planning to reduce child marriage and HNCHT in ethnic minority areas. At the same time, within the framework of Project 8, the unions at all levels have also strongly implemented many communication activities on eliminating child marriage, HNCHT and preventing and combating domestic violence (VGB) in remote communes.

Through vivid forms such as: dramatization, film screening, interactive plays, painting, group discussions, broadcasting in ethnic languages... messages about marriage at the right age, no early marriage, no forced marriage, responsibilities and roles of genders in marriage as well as gender equality in the family are also conveyed to every family and every individual.

Community intervention models such as the “Leaders of Change” club, community media groups and community trust sites are also effective communication channels in the locality. After being established and put into operation, the models have been effective in changing people’s awareness.

Specifically, 5/5 districts in the project area have developed implementation plans and established and operated key models of the project. 171 community communication teams have been established with 1,560 members; the executive board of 54 "Trusted Addresses" in the community has disseminated 121 sessions to 7,220 people about eliminating child marriage, HNCHT, preventing and combating domestic violence, and established and maintained 29 "Leaders of Change" clubs in schools.

At the “Leaders of Change” club models, communication work on eliminating human trafficking, HNCHT, child health care, and preventing sexual abuse is more important than ever. Instead of being run by teachers, many programs and activities are now led by ethnic minority students.

“You are the ones who are the ones making the change, so more than anyone else, when you speak up and speak up, it means that you yourself are aware of the harms, potential risks and consequences that can occur if you continue to maintain bad customs in marriage. Therefore, we always create conditions for you to have the opportunity to participate and try as much as possible in communication activities organized by the school and organizations,” said Nguyen Dang Quan, the Head of the Youth Union of Xy Primary and Secondary School, Huong Hoa District.

In addition, the Women's Union at all levels organized 57 communication campaigns on gender equality (GEM); prevention and control of domestic violence, building a safe living environment for women and children (W&C) at the district and commune levels, and communes where the province selected to deploy pilot models with more than 6,450 participants. The Provincial Women's Union organized a forum and a contest on "GEM Communication Initiative and Prevention and Control of Domestic Violence" in 2023 and a contest for composing communication works on GEM for children in ethnic minority and mountainous areas.

The Women's Union of Huong Hoa, Dakrong, Vinh Linh, Gio Linh districts organized 20 exchanges and festivals to share experiences of community communication groups. The contest "Communication Initiatives on Gender Equality"; "Creative and effective models in communication to eliminate gender prejudice, prevent domestic violence, prevent abuse and trafficking of women and children"; "Listen to your children"... with 1,310 participants. Through the competitions, exchanges and festivals, members of the community communication groups shared and learned experiences to improve their knowledge, skills and methods of mobilizing women members and people in ethnic minority and mountainous areas to change their thinking and ways of doing things.

Diversifying forms of propaganda and digitizing communication materials are also emphasized by all levels of the association. To date, the Provincial Women's Union has distributed more than 24,000 leaflets on domestic violence, thousands of flipcharts on eliminating child marriage, preventing and combating domestic violence, and providing reproductive health care for adolescents.

At the same time, post digitalized podcasts, videos, and audio books provided by the Central Committee of the Vietnam Women's Union on the social networking platform Facebook to raise people's awareness, eliminate bad customs and gender stereotypes, build happy families, share responsibilities in raising children, speak out against violence, and resolve conflicts, contributing to creating a better future for women and children in ethnic minority and mountainous areas.

Tran Cat Linh

Source: https://baoquangtri.vn/thay-doi-hanh-vi-cua-dong-bao-dan-toc-thieu-so-trong-hon-nhan-193624.htm