In this piece, Esrat Karim, a Bangladesh-based social entrepreneur and founder of the Amal Foundation shares how initiatives can support young women and girls to avoid early marriage and remain in school.
Child marriage is often treated as a cultural issue, but it remains closely tied to poverty and insecurity. For many struggling households, families often feel forced to marry off their daughters as a coping strategy to reduce financial pressure. But this practice has long-lasting effects and consequences, limiting girls’ education, health, and economic opportunities.
Bangladesh ranks among the top ten countries in the world with the highest prevalence of child marriage, where one in two young women are married before their eighteenth birthday. But decisions about girls’ education are rarely personal choices, instead they are shaped by economic conditions, social expectations, and household vulnerability. Child marriage is also more common in rural areas and among poorer households, where girls face greater barriers to education and opportunities.
There is a strong link between access to education and child marriage in Bangladesh. Married girls are more than four times as likely to be out of school as their unmarried peers, while early marriage reduces women’s future earning potential by an estimated 9 percent due to its negative impact on educational attainment (World Bank, 2017). Child marriage is also both a form and a driver of gender-based violence (GBV), exposing girls to increased risks of physical, emotional, and sexual abuse.
Nafiza and the Pressures Facing Girls
A seventh-grade student with a passion for learning, Nafiza who is from a small village in Ukhiya Upazila, wanted to continue her education. However, at home, her family of six were struggling financially to feed the family. Nafiza’s father owned a small grocery store but their income was not enough to keep up with rising daily expenses. In 2024 and 2025, average inflation reached 10 percent, the highest level in 14 years in Bangladesh, while food inflation rose to 10.7 percent, significantly increasing the cost of essential commodities and affecting the wellbeing of vulnerable populations.
As the family’s financial situation worsened, conversations increasingly shifted from schoolbooks to survival. Faced with mounting economic pressures, Nafiza’s parents began considering whether marriage might offer a way to ease the financial burden. The prospect of arranging her marriage seemed like a practical solution. For Nafiza, however, leaving school would not only have ended her education but also limited her future opportunities.
Kolal Para, Ukhiya Upazila
Ukhia Upazila is in Cox’s Bazar District, which is a vulnerable sub-district in Bangladesh (CVI, 2025). It is home to over 302,689 people, the area has experienced significant socio-economic and humanitarian pressures which continue to shape everyday life and have long-term development outcomes. These challenges have been further intensified by the impacts of the Rohingya refugee crisis since 2017 placing additional demands on local infrastructure.
Educational inequalities remain a major concern. The literacy rate in Ukhiya is around 70%, which is significantly lower than the national average of 79 percent, reflecting broader inequalities in access to education and opportunity.
Additionally, climate vulnerability including cyclone, flooding, salinity, extreme weather, and environmental degradation further compounds these challenges, placing an added burden on already at-risk households. Within the Upazila, Kolal Para is considered one of the most vulnerable villages, as it covers a significant portion of the refugee camp.
Child Marriage After the Pandemic
According to a 2023 government survey, rates of child marriage increased significantly in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic. The economic disruption caused by the pandemic contributed to a rise from 32.4 percent in 2021 to 41.6 percent in 2023. The survey also found that 8.2 percent of young women had gotten married before they were 15.
These figures highlight the scale of the challenge facing Bangladesh. Despite national efforts to address the issue, progress remains uneven, and achieving the national target of reducing child marriage to 20% by 2025 has not happened. This is despite the legal age for marriage being 18 for women under the Child Marriage Restriction Act, 2017.
For families facing economic insecurity in rural Bangladesh, the gap between legal protections and lived realities can be substantial. In Nafiza’s case, that turning point came in early 2025 when the Amal Foundation stepped in.
The Amal Foundation
Amal Foundation is a women-led non-profit organisation committed to advancing social justice, human dignity, and inclusive development in Bangladesh. Since its inception in 2014, the Foundation has been working to address the challenges faced by marginalised communities through integrated initiatives in education, healthcare, climate action, and economic development.
Education is at the core of Amal Foundation’s work, which promotes empowerment, equity, and inclusion for marginalised communities by addressing barriers such as gender inequality, unsafe learning environments, and poverty. Girls’ education is often disrupted by the widespread social acceptance of child marriage. To respond to these challenges, Amal Foundation integrates education with innovative approaches such as the Child Marriage Prevention Loan (CMPL), focusing on strengthening knowledge, and life competencies to overcome educational barriers.
Rather than treating child marriage as an isolated social issue, the Foundation approaches it as part of a wider web of economic vulnerability and structural inequality through its Child Marriage Prevention Loan (CMPL) Programme. This is a pioneering initiative by the Amal Foundation with IPDC Finance, Just People Australia, and World Vision, designed to dismantle the economic drivers of child marriage in rural Bangladesh. Under this initiative, interest-free loans are disbursed to vulnerable families with adolescent girls to support income-generating activities and reduce the financial pressures that often drive child marriage, under the conditions that the families do not marry off their daughters before the age of 18 and ensure their continued education up to Higher Secondary level (HSC). Moreover, research by the World Bank (Economic Impacts of Child Marriage) shows that keeping girls in school significantly improves long-term economic outcomes for families and communities.
Since 2022, this sustainable, community-led model has empowered over 557 families across Bogura, Khulna, and Cox’s Bazar. With a 100% repayment rate and a significant drop in young women and girls leaving school, Child Marriage Prevention Loan (CMPL) Programme demonstrates how economic empowerment or ensuring a family’s financial independence can directly contribute to protecting girls’ education and future opportunities.
Nafiza’s family were offered a 25,500 Bangladesh Taka (BDT) interest-free loan (equivalent to 200 USD). This allowed them to purchase a fresh stock of grocery items to enhance their struggling business. Along with the financial support, the Foundation also provided counselling for the parents, creating space for reflection on the longer-term value of girls’ education and the broader physical and social consequences of child marriage. Nafiza now attends school every day of the week with the full support and encouragement of her family.
“I was afraid marriage meant the end of my education, but today, my parents encourage me to dream big.” Nafiza reflects. Aspiring to become a doctor, Nafiza aims to make a difference in her community. Nafiza’s story illustrates how addressing the economic roots of child marriage can help create alternatives for families facing insecurity.
While financial support alone cannot dismantle the structural inequalities driving child marriage in Bangladesh, initiatives that combine economic assistance with community engagement may offer one pathway to keep more girls in school and expand their future opportunities.
By strengthening legislative and policy frameworks and ensuring their effective implementation it is possible to protect girls from child marriage and gender based violence. Coordinating government efforts and community initiatives will ensure that every girl has the right to learn, grow, and reach her full potential.
About Esrat Karim Eve
Esrat Karim Eve is a visionary social entrepreneur and the founder of Amal Foundation, which she established in 2014 to build a world where everyone can lead a healthy, dignified life. Driven by a mission to break the cycle of poverty through sustainable social business, she focuses on empowering women and the poor in Bangladesh’s most remote areas by providing vocational training and essential rights.
She envisions a Bangladesh where marginalized communities are self-reliant, moving beyond mere charity toward long-term economic independence. She holds a degree in Finance from the University of Dhaka and a Master’s in Social Entrepreneurship from the University of Colorado, which supports her expertise. A global leader in her field, Esrat was recognized in Forbes’ 30 Under 30 (Asia) and has received prestigious honors, including the Youth Icon 2018 and the GITA Global Award.
