“A girl is not property”: Why we’ve launched a Girl Agenda

A new start

In the next few weeks, a new Secretary-General of the United Nations (UN) will be appointed.

He or she will take office at the start of next year. They’ll hold the post for five years.

This is an important global moment. Why? Because the Secretary-General is uniquely placed to speak on behalf of the world’s population – all 7 billion of us.

Putting the Global Goals into action

The world is beginning to put into place the Global Goals for Sustainable Development, a set of promises that could save 6,500 children’s lives – every single day – for the next 15 years.

The Global Goals promise to leave no one behind, and we have the opportunity to ask the Secretary-General to champion the rights of some of the world’s most excluded children – girls.

Girls’ freedom taken away

We know that millions of girls and women have been left behind by global progress – forgotten simply because they’re female.

Girls all over the world are being robbed of their power, facing gender inequality and violations in many different ways.

They’re being denied education and essential health services. They’re facing child marriage, trafficking, forced labour, and sexual abuse. They’re subjected to daily assaults on their freedom.

Leila’s story

They’re children like Leila, who married when she was 15 so that her family could afford medicine for her sick grandmother.

Her husband abused her emotionally and physically. She tried to kill herself twice.

After a year of misery, her grandparents helped her to get a divorce. But the stigma of being a divorcee means she’s now denied an education.

Our Girl Agenda

We want to build a world where every girl is free – where she has power over her own body and mind. Because a girl is not property.

That’s why we’ve partnered with Girls Not Brides, Global Citizen and Project Everyone (The Global Goals) to create The Girl Agenda.

Supported by the International Centre for Research on Women (ICRW), Together for Girls, and The Hunger Project, The Girl Agenda pools knowledge on five key issues for gender equality: child marriage; data; education; laws, practices, norms; and sexual and reproductive health and rights.

It’s an action plan that the Secretary-General can use to help girls all over the world.

Standing up for girls

For too long the movement for women and girls has been fragmented – with different sub-issues competing with one another.

The appointment of a new UN Secretary-General gives us the chance to make one giant leap forward for girls, by tackling lots of issues at the same time.

The Secretary-General is uniquely placed to prioritise empowering girls on the global stage.

The success of the Global Goals depends on it.

You can add your voice

Want to know more? Read The Girl Agenda.

Sign our petition to make sure no child is forgotten because of who they are or where they live.

*Names have been changed to protect identities