Adolescent girls in West and Central Africa
UNICEF in West and Central Africa believes in the potential of adolescent girls and strives to support their transformative leadership
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Challenges
West and Central Africa (WCA) is home to over 75 million girls with a powerful sense of hope and optimism about their future. As 11% of the world's adolescent girl population, adolescent girls in WCA learn, lead and confront challenges while experiencing some of the worst indicators in the globe.
Many challenges occur at the same time in different stages of adolescence for girls.
Without their births registered, girls have limited access to basic social services. When girls are married or mothers too soon, their schooling is interrupted. If they cannot access school, they are at higher risk of being married too young, with early motherhood to follow. And, married or not, the risk of sexual violence can provoke trauma and increased risk of STI, including HIV, as well as unwanted pregnancies that can affect their ability to finish school, make meaningful social connections with peers and find decent employment.
Girls in WCA are less happy when gender inequality is high (In Pursuit of Happiness), which also affects the number of hours they spend on domestic chores or the stigma they may face due to their menstruation. Disabled or displaced girls, and those living in fragile contexts, face all these things at a higher degree, with lesser supports to overcome.
The Facts:
- Highest adolescent birth rate in the world with 97 births per 1,000 adolescent girls aged 15–19 and 3 births per adolescent girls aged 10–14. The world average is respectively 39 and 1.
- Maternal conditions are among the top five causes of mortality for adolescent girls aged 15–19.
- Height out of 10 new HIV infections among adolescents in WCA are among girls.
- Literacy rates are lower for adolescent girls and young women - 68 percent compared with 78 percent for their male counterparts.
- Inadequate learning conditions in the school environment block girls’ access to education.
- When it comes to decisions on the major national, regional and global policies that impact their own lives, too often girls are not invited to the decision-making table, or their voice not valued.
- Twenty-four of the 25 WCA countries with available information are rated as facing either major or significant challenges on Sustainable Development Goal 5 (SDG 5) progress, with only six years left to reach the 2030 targets.
Solutions
Despite these challenges, girls in WCA are determined to overcome and make change for themselves, other girls and their communities. In the 10 countries with available data in WCA, 77% to 98% believe that their lives will improve in the coming year. UNICEF in WCA strives to convert this hope to reality by working with girls and a range of other partners.
Our vision is that adolescent girls should have the freedom and power to make decisions about their lives and pursue opportunities within a protective and enabling environment for their individual and collective wellbeing.
Adopting a Girl Intentional Approach, UNICEF in WCA supports five accelerating strategies that will yield multiple impact for girls. These strategies include:
Girls at the center of programme and policy decisions. This includes not only girls’ participation in municipal and national decisions around the types of laws, policies and programs that will protect their rights, but also the micro decisions that have a macro impact on their lives such as what subjects to study at school, when to have children and who they can be friends with.
Access to quality services where and when girls need them. These services could be health, WASH, education, social protection, nutrition, justice or otherwise. But they must have a common focus on quality services for inclusive, gender and age-appropriate services for all girls, no matter where they are.
Transforming gender norms that leave girls behind. At the core of girls’ inequality is gender inequality. Gender equalities that permeate laws and policies, the ways in which services are structured and delivered and the ways in which girls are valued equally by their peers, families and communities.
Partnerships with girls and girl-focused organizations. Just as all sectors are pivotal to reverting worrying trends for girls, grassroots and national organizations that prioritize girls’ rights must be full partners in provoking the changes girls are asking for.
- Evidence-generation and monitoring. Filling gaps on girls’ lives, with the right level of disaggregation, remains a steadfast priority, as do investments in program monitoring that goes beyond the numbers of girls’ reached to measuring reductions in girls’ inequalities and improvements in their rights.