There are 5.5 million girls and women living in Uganda today who were married before age 18, 1.6 million of whom were married before they were 15.1 Currently, 33 per cent of young women aged 20 to 24 married before age 18, and 6 per cent of women aged 20 to 24 married before they turned 15.

In remote and hard-to-reach communities, deeply entrenched cultural practices and societal norms continue to drive child marriage. In regions such as West Nile and Karamoja, religious and traditional beliefs, coupled with economic hardship, contribute to persistently high rates of child marriage. Poverty remains a key driver of child marriage, with 16 per cent of the population living below the absolute poverty line (US$1 per person per day)3, leading vulnerable families to resort to marrying off daughters in exchange for dowries. Enforcing laws against child marriage remains difficult due to community resistance. Marriages now often occur without traditional ceremonies, as parents adopt discreet methods such as exchanging dowry in markets or marrying off girls in distant communities. This makes it harder for local surveillance systems to identify cases of child marriage.