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INTRODUCTION
Every year, more than one billion children – or half of the world’s children – experience some form of violence. Exposure to violence compromises a child’s mental and social development, hampers educational outcomes, and reduces opportunities for gainful employment. It is estimated that physical, sexual, and emotional violence against children costs societies 3% to 8% of global GDP.
Current data indicates that up to 50% of sexual assaults worldwide are committed against girls under the age of 16. Risks are particularly high in conflict-affected countries – globally, at least 72 million children are living among or near armed groups who have a history of perpetrating sexual violence against children.
Sexual violence can cause children immediate physical injuries, psychological harm, and long-term debilitating physical conditions. This may result in lifelong costs of healthcare and loss of quality of life, alongside the possibility of early pregnancy and related lower levels of education. One of the most invisible and under-reported forms of sexual violence occurs in child marriages, which traps children in situations where they are unable to report or get help when they are sexually abused, and have to face the associated negative implications of sexual violence without support.
There is also evidence that sexual violence against children, and especially child marriage, increased during the COVID-19 pandemic. Measures aimed to stem the spread of disease impeded normal child protection and monitoring services, and the widespread closure of schools pushed many girls towards child marriage. The secondary impacts of the pandemic caused a surge in poverty and in turn an increase in negative coping mechanisms such as child marriage and child labour. This is supported by World Vision’s own field-level data, which shows a 163% increase in child marriages in the first 18 months of the pandemic, compared to the 18 months leading up to March 2020. Reports of other forms of sexual violence, including rape and attempted rape, also increased by 50%.
Despite the commitments of donors, the evidence clearly shows that ending sexual violence against children is a seriously underfunded issue, both at national and global levels. This lack of funding and implementation is an increasingly concerning trend, especially given the increase in sexual violence and child marriage during the COVID-19 pandemic and increased income and food insecurity. World Vision warned that the side effects of the COVID-19 pandemic would cause an increase in child marriage and other forms of violence against children, and called for increased funding to protect children, as early as May 2020. Instead, funding only decreased. The data in this report shows that Official Development Assistance (ODA) on projects to end child marriage and address sexual violence against children decreased in 2020, the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic.
163%
increase in child marriages in the first 18 months of the pandemic
50%
increase in other forms of sexual violence, including rape and attempted rape