Publication: GIL Top Policy Lessons on Empowering Adolescent Girls
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2024-05-31
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2024-05-31
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Overlapping crises such as climate change, the ongoing recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, regional conflicts and rising global food insecurity exacerbate the inequalities faced by adolescent girls, making them particularly vulnerable in these critical times. For many girls, these circumstances force them to make decisions about employment and their fertility at an early age, limits their access to formal education, and further exposes them to restrictive social norms. Additionally, domestic responsibilities limit adolescent girls’ time in school and educational achievement, in turn curtailing their ability to enter the labor force. With 60 percent of the total population of Africa under the age of 25, investing in empowering adolescent girls is critical to accelerate economic growth and reduce intergenerational poverty.
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“World Bank. 2024. GIL Top Policy Lessons on Empowering Adolescent Girls. © World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/41636 License: CC BY-NC 3.0 IGO.”
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Publication GIL Top Policy Lessons on Empowering Adolescent Girls(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2020-01)Adolescent girls face multiple challenges that restrict their horizons, often having to make decisions about employment and their fertility at an early age, and with limited formal education opportunities. With lower levels of education than men, girls are often less equipped for work. Additionally, a plethora of expected domestic responsibilities limit their time for income-generating opportunities. A range of gender innovation lab (GIL) studies across Sub-Saharan Africa have demonstrated the potential of girls’ empowerment programs to change the life trajectories of young women even across a variety of contexts. These programs typically combine community-based girls clubs, life-skills training, vocational training, and sometimes financial literacy and microcredit access, for young women. 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