Vanuatu

21% of girls in Vanuatu marry before the age of 18 and 3% marry before the age of 15.

5% of boys in Vanuatu marry before the age of 18.

According to a 2007 MICS survey, child marriage is most common in rural areas and in particular Tafea, Shefa and Penama. Data also suggests that girls who marry young in Vanuatu are likely to marry older men and consequently become widows at early ages.

Child marriage is driven by gender inequality and the belief that women and girls are somehow inferior to men and boys.

There is very limited information on child marriage in Vanuatu, but available studies suggest that it is driven by:

Poverty: Women from Vanuatu’s poorest households are likely to marry about half a year earlier than women from the richest households.

Level of education: Education has been shown to delay marriage in Vanuatu. Women who have completed secondary education tend to marry two years later than those with primary level education.

Harmful practices: Arranged and forced marriages are still practised in some parts of Vanuatu. The exchange of girls for gifts – known as bride price – encourages some families to marry their daughters and contributes to a perception that girls are “possessions”.

Vanuatu 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.

Vanuatu co-sponsored the 2013, 2014 and 2016 UN General Assembly resolutions on child, early and forced marriage.

Vanuatu ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1993, which the Committee on the Rights of the Child has interpreted to recommend the establishment of a minimum age of marriage of 18, and acceded to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) in 1995, which obligates states to ensure free and full consent to marriage.

In 2014 and 2016, the CEDAW Committee urged the government to raise the minimum age of marriage for girls to 18 and expressed regret that there had been no relevant amendment of the Control of Marriage Act 2006 to date.

In 2017, the UN Committee of the Rights of the Child urged Vanuatu to revise the Control of Marriage Act to ensure that the minimum age for marriage is established at 18 for both girls and boys and take all necessary measures to eliminate child marriages.

During its 2019 Universal Periodic Review, Vanuatu supported recommendations to revise legislation to raise the minimum age for marriage in compliance with international human rights standards and end child, early and forced marriage.

During Vanuatu’s 2014 Universal Periodic Review, concerns were raised about the different minimum age for marriage between girls and boys. The Committee questioned what specific measures have been taken to prevent child marriage in the country.

Vanuatu is one of the focus countries in the Pacific region where the Spotlight Initiative (a global, multi-year partnership between the European Union and the United Nations) is supporting partners and institutions to eliminate all forms of violence against women and girls by 2030.

Vanuatu is a partner development country of the Global Partnership for Education.

Regionally, the Spotlight Pacific Regional Initiative builds on existing commitments across 16 Pacific Island countries, including Vanuatu. In 2020, the Prime Minister launched the European Union and United Nations Spotlight Initiative Vanuatu Country Programme. This initiative focuses on strengthening efforts to end domestic violence, intimate partner violence and violence against women through six key strategies:

- Law and policies

- Institutions

- Prevention

- Services

- Data

- Civil society/women’s organisations

In 2022, the Spotlight Initiative achieved:

The first draft of the Victims’ Charter and Victim Policy was developed by the Office of the Public Prosecutor. This Policy sets out the rights of victims and the services that they can access within the criminal justice system.

A Victim Support Office was opened in Port Vila, which includes a confidential space for victims of gender-based violence.

6 out-of-school comprehensive sexuality education curriculums were completed and rolled out across different provinces.

Increased knowledge on child maltreatment and the availability of services, 1,740 people across 32 schools and communities were reached.

94 health workers across 68 facilities were trained by the Ministry of Health on the sexual and gender-based violence Clinical Standards Operating Procedures. This resulted in 10,799 individuals being able to access gender-based violence services.

A gender-based violence and Mental Health and Psychological Support (MHPSS) tool guide was developed.

The National Gender Equality Policy (2015-2019) identified the need to amend discriminatory provisions in existing legislation related to marriage to comply with CEDAW.

Under the Control of Marriage Act 2006 the legal age for marriage is 21 years. However, boys aged 18 and girls aged 16 can be married with parental permission.

While the Control of Marriage Act 2006 also applies to custom marriages, under customary law, known as the kastom system, a girl is considered to be ready for marriage soon after the start of menstruation.