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Do Child Marriage Programs Help Girls Weather Shocks Like Covid-19? Evidence from the More Than Brides Alliance

Andrea Melnikas, Population Council
Saul Grace, Population Council
Neelanjana Pandey, PopulationCouncil Consulting
Sajeda Amin, Population Council

The More Than Brides Alliance’s project “Marriage: No Child’s Play” sought to empower girls, raise awareness about the risks of child marriage, improve girls’ access to sexual and reproductive health services, and support social norms favoring girls’ education, economic engagement, and agency. We conducted a cluster randomized trial to assess impact, surveying girls ages 12-19 at baseline (2016), midline (2018), and endline (2020). Difference-in-differences analysis demonstrated that MNCP was effective at reducing child marriage prevalence, which declined by 69% in intervention areas (from 14.8% to 4.5%) and by 22% in comparison areas (p<.05). Interestingly, we see that child marriage declined from baseline to midline everywhere (both declined about 30%), but then either increased or plateaued in comparison areas, while continuing to decline in intervention areas. We posit that this change in trends between intervention and comparison groups since midline is due in part to Covid-19 and that MNCP had an influence on helping girls and communities weather the shock of the pandemic. Findings suggest that interventions like MNCP may be successful in improving adolescent girls’ resiliency through social supports like mentors and building assets that improve their capacity to manage stress and insecurity in times of crisis.

Keywords: Children and youth, Outcome and impact evaluations, COVID-19

See paper.

  Presented in Session 13. Enabling Children and Adolescents to Realize their Full Potential: What Works and What Does Not?