International Day of the Girl Child
Did you know that 33,000 little girls are married off every day around the world and about 44% of them believe it is acceptable for their husband to abuse his wife?
Girls and women make up 96 percent of those trafficked for sexual exploitation, with an estimated 340,000 of them infected with HIV each year. One in 3 women worldwide has experienced physical or sexual violence.
Investing in realizing adolescent girls’ power can protect their rights and ensures a fair and prosperous future, which is what observing an international day of the girl child aims for.
Background
The Beijing Declaration, issued in 1995 during the World Conference on Women in Beijing, was the first to advocate for women’s and girls’ rights. In 2011, the United Nations designated October 11 as International Day of the Girl Child. It is a globally recognized yearly commemoration that empowers girls and amplifies their voices. It draws attention to the importance of addressing the difficulties that girls experience, such as child marriages, limited educational chances, abuse, and prejudice, as well as promoting girls’ empowerment and human rights fulfillment.
Since its inception, the International Day of the Girl Child has had a specific theme each year. The theme of this year is “Digital generation. Our generation” really emphasizes the digital revolution for all, with all.
“Digital generation. Our generation.”
Just as the world entered the second year of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Generation Equality Forum issued five-year pledges for greater solutions to gender inequality in 2021.
Globally, nearly 1 in 4 girls aged 15–19 years is neither working nor in school or training compared to 1 in 10 boys of the same age. Despite the fact that the pandemic has accelerated digitized learning, earning, and socializing, 2.2 billion people under the age of 25 still do not have access to the internet at home, with girls being the most affected.
The gender-based digital divide is considerably more than just internet accessibility. Girls are also less likely than boys to own and use devices as well as have access to tech-related skills and jobs.
Girls do more unpaid child labor than boys, emerging data also shows that by 2021 around 435 million women and girls will be living on less than $1.90 a day — including 47 million pushed into poverty as a result of COVID-19. So, in this technologically growing period, when new technical employment sectors emerging every day, providing technical education is becoming the most essential investment in the empowerment of girls and young women.
Girls are well-versed in their digital reality and the solutions required to pave the way for freedom of expression, joy, and limitless potential. Let’s work together to open up these doors so that this generation of females may become a generation of technologists.
Ways to get involved
1. Actively take part in the theme
Find out what the year’s theme is and take part in it by initiating social media campaigns using the hashtag #BrighterFutureForGirls, #GirlsTakeOver, #FreeToBeOnline, #OurGirlsMatter,#DayoftheGirl, and others. Participate in the digital activism movement developed by young people all around the world to increase the variety of girls’ voices and their vision for a reinvented future.
2. Make the girls in your life feel special!
Give your adolescent daughter, sister, or any other young woman in your life a token of your appreciation by empowering her in any way you can. Why wait till their birthdays or other important occasions? Encourage them, inspire them, and give them high-quality education and skill training to prepare them for the future they desire. Develop them into the next generation of activists who will accelerate social change.
3. Share, share, and share.
Share stories of inspiring teenage girls and girl-led organizations which make an effort for a better future for young women. They develop innovative and inspiring solutions which accelerate towards a positive social change in gender-based challenges that little girls face around the world, including child marriages, poor learning opportunities, violence, and discrimination. Let us appreciate and amplify their leadership, hard work and also being an inspiration to many.
4. Share a true story on social media
Share true stories of yourselves or any girls that you know about the challenges or issues they face as a girl, as well as their under-appreciated successes and contributions.
Every day, girls break down barriers and boundaries to address issues such as child marriage, educational inequity, violence, climate justice, and unequal access to healthcare. Girls are constantly proving that they can achieve anything.
Only by addressing injustice and exclusion across regions and generations, and safeguarding the rights of girls can we achieve equality and inclusion in getting digital education and can we usher in a digital revolution for all, with all, and thus pave the way for long-term sustainable education for current and future generations. Let us hope this years’ international day of the girl child would be a catalyst for that social remodeling.
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