Nauru
Prevalence rates
Child marriage by 15
Child marriage by 18
Interactive atlas of child marriage
Explore child marriage data in an interactive map view and layer data sets.
Other key stats
| Are there Girls Not Brides members? | No |
| Does this country have a national strategy or plan? | No |
| Is there a Girls Not Brides National Partnership or coalition? | No |
| Age of marriage without consent or exceptions taken into account | Legal age of marriage - 18 years or above, no exceptions |
What's the prevalence rate?
What drives child marriage in Nauru?
Child marriage is driven by gender inequality and the belief that women and girls are somehow inferior to men and boys.
There is limited information on child marriage in Nauru.
In Nauru, child marriage is exacerbated by:
Adolescent pregnancy: The age at marriage is a determinant of fertility as Nauruan women who marry younger are more likely to have more children. 22% of girls give birth before the age of 18.
What international, regional and national commitments has Nauru made?
Nauru has committed to ending child, early and forced marriage by 2030 in line with target 5.3 of the Sustainable Development Goals. The government has not submitted a Voluntary National Review in any High Level Political Forum to date.
Nauru co-sponsored the 2014 UN General Assembly resolution on child, early and forced marriage.
Nauru acceded to the Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1994, which the Committee on the Rights of the Child has interpreted to recommend the establishment of a minimum age of marriage of 18, and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) in 2011, which obligates states to ensure free and full consent to marriage.
During its 2020 Universal Periodic Review, the CEDAW Committee expressed concern at the rising number of child marriages and adolescent pregnancies. It recommended that a national programme be implemented to prevent adolescent pregnancy through comprehensive age-appropriate education on sexual and reproductive health and accessibility to contraception for boys and girls.
During its 2017 review, the CEDAW Committee raised concerns about the high rate of adolescent pregnancies in Nauru and the resulting number of child marriages.
During its 2015 Universal Periodic Review, Nauru supported recommendations to combat child marriage through reinforcing necessary legal frameworks and increasing the legal age of marriage to 18.
Regionally, the Spotlight Pacific Regional Initiative builds on existing commitments across 16 Pacific Island countries, including Nauru.
What is the minimum legal framework around marriage?
Article 49 of the Child Protection and Welfare Act 2016 prohibits the marriage of girls and boys younger than 18. This applies to both legal and customary marriages.
Data sources
- Gastón, C. M., et al., Child marriage among boys: a global overview of available data, Vulnerable Children and Youth Studies, 14:3, p. 219-228, 2019, https://doi.org/10.1080/17450128.2019.1566584 (accessed January 2020).
- Government of Nauru, Nauru Demographic and Health Survey, 2007, https://spccfpstore1.blob.core.windows.net/digitallibrary-docs/files/72/720716318a778e98a8f58aeb6e01eb4e.pdf?sv=2015-12-11&sr=b&sig=Ot47h9zbaiZ3EbxckU9SWGp3Wwqvv0ME89qeIox6O18%3D&se=2025-01-13T08%3A17%3A58Z&sp=r&rscc=public%2C%20max-age%3D864000%2C%20max-stale%3D86400&rsct=application%2Fpdf&rscd=inline%3B%20filename%3D%22Nauru_Demographic_and_Health_Survey_DHS_Report_2007.pdf%22 (accessed July 2024).
- Republic of Nauru, Child Protection and Welfare Act 2016 No. 33 of 2016, 2016, http://ronlaw.gov.nr/nauru_lpms/files/acts/66d8a517262f0adab959f3155b08b0db.pdf (accessed October 2021).
- UN CEDAW, Concluding observations on the combined initial and second periodic reports of Nauru, 2017, p.9, http://tbinternet.ohchr.org/_layouts/treatybodyexternal/Download.aspx?symbolno=CEDAW/C/NRU/CO/1-2&Lang=En (accessed January 2020).
- UN General Assembly, Report of the Working Group on the Universal Periodic Review, Nauru, 2015, p.16, https://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/UPR/Pages/NRindex.aspx (accessed January 2020).
- UN General Assembly, National report submitted in accordance with paragraph 5 of the annex to Human Rights Council resolution 16/21* Nauru, 2020, https://undocs.org/A/HRC/WG.6/37/NRU/1 (accessed October 2021).
- UN General Assembly, Report of the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, 2020, https://documents.un.org/doc/undoc/gen/g20/275/29/pdf/g2027529.pdf?token=xksHDCeENfHoM3i2gM&fe=true (accessed October 2021).
- United Nations, Sustainable Development Knowledge Platform, [website], 2017, https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/sdg5 (accessed January 2020).
- United Nations Information Centre Canberra, UNICEF Welcomes Nauru Child Protection Act, 2016, [website], https://un.org.au/2016/06/16/unicef-welcomes-nauru-child-protection-act/2/ (accessed January 2020).
- UNICEF, Situation Analysis of Children in Nauru, 2017, https://www.unicef.org/pacificislands/media/1161/file/Situation-Analysis-of-Children-Nauru.pdf (accessed January 2020).
- UNICEF, The State of the World’s Children 2021, 2021, https://www.unicef.org/media/108161/file/SOWC-2021-full-report-English.pdf (accessed October 2021).
- UNICEF and Ministry of Home Affairs, Review of the Child Protection system in Nauru, 2015, https://reliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.int/files/resources/Nauru-ChildProtection-Review_0.pdf (accessed October 2021).
- UNICEF Pacific, Situation Analysis of Children in Nauru, 2017, https://www.unicef.org/pacificislands/media/1161/file/Situation-Analysis-of-Children-Nauru.pdf (accessed October 2021).
- United Nations Pacific, UN and EU launch Spotlight Initiative Regional Pacific Programme, 2020, https://pacific.un.org/en/95723-un-and-eu-launch-spotlight-initiative-regional-pacific-programme (accessed October 2021).