This month a new global effort to end child marriage was announced at the 2011 Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) Annual Meeting, turning the international spotlight on a harmful traditional practice that affects the lives of 10 million girls in dozens of countries around the world every year. As CGI members, The Elders, the Ford Foundation, the Nike Foundation and the NoVo Foundation committed to:
– Building Girls Not Brides into a fully-fledged partnership organisation, with at least 150 members running programmes in at least 20 countries by December 2012.
– Raising US$3 million to ensure the functioning of the partnership, the creation of a secretariat, and to seed activities to end child marriage in priority countries.
– Establishing a network of donors to support programmes to end child marriage worldwide.