Natural disasters and girls vulnerability: is child marriage a coping strategy of economic shocks in Indonesia?

ABSTRACT

Indonesia is a country that is highly prone to natural disasters, while at the same time faces a high child marriage prevalence compared to other Asia Pacific countries. Many studies show that in times of humanitarian crisis, child marriage practices, which heavily affect girls, are increasing. This study then intends to examine quantitatively any association between natural disasters and child marriages in Indonesia by using the 2015 National Socio-Economic Survey (SUSENAS) and the 2014 Village Potential Census (PODES). By applying logistic regression and controlling the model with several socio-economic conditions such as education, religion and regional characteristics, this study finds that natural disasters are positively associated with the probability of girls entering child marriage. Child marriage could be one of the options for households to reduce the burden when they face adverse welfare effects from natural disasters. Furthermore, disaster mitigation significantly reduces the probability of child marriage because disaster mitigation and preparedness will lessen the devastating shocks of the disasters, reducing the need to then enter into child marriage. The strong relationship between child marriage and natural disasters should attract the attention of policymakers to conduct better disaster mitigation programs, as well as to effectively provide assistance to the most vulnerable members of communities when natural disasters occur.

KEYWORDS:

• Child marriage
• natural disaster
• consumption smoothing
• vulnerability
• economic shocks

Acknowledgments

The authors thank the reviewer, participants at the 2^nd International Conference on Indonesian Economy and Development (ICIED) and also members of Dartanto’s weekly meeting for their valuable comments that have helped improve the quality of this article. The authors also thank the 2017 and 2018 Hibah PITTA Universitas Indonesia for generously funding this research. All remaining errors are our responsibility.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. The percentage of women aged 10 and above who married before 18-years old compared to the total number of marriages. Calculated using the 2015 SUSENAS data.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Hibah PITTA Universitas Indonesia [No. 320/UN2.R3.1/HKP.05.00/2017 & No. 1745/UN2.R3.1/HKP.05.00/2018].