Climate-Driven Child Marriage Threatens Girls Worldwide

The climate crisis is quietly redrawing the futures of girls across the Global South, according to a landmark report released by Plan International. The study, titled State of the World's Girls 2026: Change Her Forecast, reveals how floods, droughts, cyclones and extreme heat are driving climate-driven child marriage, teenage pregnancy and sexual violence. The findings, published via ReliefWeb this week, combine a large-scale analysis of health and climate data spanning more than 50 countries over three decades with a survey of 5K girls and in-depth interviews in Bangladesh, Kenya, Peru, Senegal and Zimbabwe.

For girls, the climate crisis is not a distant threat. According to the report, it is already disrupting their education and increasing the risks they face when they cannot access health services. When disaster strikes, the institutions girls depend on most - schools and health clinics - are often the first to collapse, leaving them exposed at the precise moment they need protection most.

Disasters destroy the services girls depend on

The research found that climate disasters are destroying health and education services at the worst possible moment. More than three-quarters of girls surveyed, 76 percent, said more girls and young women in their community were struggling to access at least one health service after a climate shock. Among those affected by drought, that figure rose to 84 percent. The consequences fall hardest on girls who already have the least: girls from minority communities were twice as likely to struggle to access services, nearly three times as likely to report an unintended pregnancy, and more than twice as likely to face pressure to marry young.

One in 10 girls said they had personally experienced an unintended pregnancy following a climate-related event, while 33 percent reported an increase in unintended pregnancies in their community. More than a quarter, 28 percent, said they had observed an increase in violence against women and girls after climate-related events. Girls reported increased risks of sexual exploitation in the aftermath of climate shocks, including being pressured into exchanging sex for money or basic necessities as protection systems and support networks break down. The report also notes heightened danger in emergency shelters, where cramped conditions and darkness left girls exposed to harassment and sexual violence.

Almost half of the girls surveyed, 49 percent, noticed more pregnancy-related or childbirth complications, including miscarriages, in their community following a climate shock. Nearly one in four said access to healthcare during pregnancy and delivery care became harder to reach. As Shahina, 19, from Bangladesh told researchers, when floods leave people completely destitute, families think about financial hardship and marry off girls at a very young age. Participants in the study described girls becoming pregnant from as young as 12 and 13 in Peru, with girls in Zimbabwe noting pregnancy among girls still in primary and early secondary school.

Drought is the quiet driver of early marriage

The research identifies a form of climate harm that is almost entirely absent from disaster planning: slow-onset drought. Across 52 countries and three decades, prolonged drought emerged as the hazard most consistently associated with rising rates of child marriage and early unions. As families lose harvests, livestock and income over months and years, marrying off a daughter can become a survival strategy.

One in 10 girls said they had personally married before the age of 18, and 36 percent reported seeing more girls married or in a union before they turned 18 in their community following climate-related disasters. Because slow-onset drought rarely triggers an emergency response, the damage accumulates unseen. Nine in 10 girls said climate-related events were placing serious pressure on their family's survival, health and stability. As Galgalo, a 22-year-old participant from Kenya, told the researchers, her father had no livestock left to sell to send her to college, and that was how she came to accept being married off.

Plan International CEO Reena Ghelani said that for girls, the climate crisis is not a distant threat but is already disrupting their education and increasing the risks they face. She added that only half of national climate plans mention girls' or women's health, and that despite the escalating impact of climate shocks on the health systems girls rely on, just 0.5 percent of multilateral climate finance supports health.

Education is the strongest shield

Behind many of these consequences lies a devastating reality: climate shocks are pulling girls out of school. The report's secondary analysis spanning more than 50 countries across three decades confirmed that uninterrupted education is the single most consistent protective factor against early marriage and violence. Girls whose schooling was disrupted were twice as likely to marry young or face an unintended pregnancy. In other words, when education breaks down, girls lose the single most protective factor in their lives, making them significantly more vulnerable to exploitation, violence, early marriage and lost access to health services.

The findings highlight how climate-related disasters are exacerbating existing inequalities. In Peru, girls described how recurring El Nino floods disrupted access to health services, cut off transport routes and increased pressure on already struggling families. With El Nino conditions projected to intensify further in the coming months, the window to act before these impacts deepen is narrowing, the report warns.

What governments must do before COP31

With the world's attention soon turning to COP31, where countries have an opportunity to negotiate international action on climate change, Plan International is calling on governments and donors to act. The report urges leaders to keep schools open and free during climate shocks, since education is the single most consistent protective factor across three decades of data. It also calls for allocating a defined share of climate adaptation finance to adolescent girls' health, including sexual and reproductive health services, contraception and maternity care.

The researchers further recommend that menstrual products, contraception and protection services be included in every emergency response package, not treated as a later-stage intervention, and that support reach the most marginalized girls - those from minority communities, those with disabilities and those already displaced - who face the greatest barriers and receive the least support.

In the words of Reena Ghelani, the evidence of what puts girls at risk is clear, and so is the evidence of what protects them. What is missing, she said, is not the evidence but the urgency to act on it. Girls cannot continue to be treated as an afterthought in climate action, she argued. They must have a meaningful say in the decisions that shape their lives, and their rights and needs must be built into climate policy and financing from the outset.

Source: Plan International - State of the World's Girls 2026: Change Her Forecast (via ReliefWeb).