Contested Futures: The impact of early marriage on young women's economic agency in northern Nigeria

Despite existing evidence of the negative effects of child marriages on school attendance and girls’ prospects in many countries, early marriage continues as a widespread practise in Northern Nigeria with far-reaching consequences on girls economic agency as well as outcomes on national development in Nigeria. On the basis of the above premise, the study seeks to take into account the multifaceted nature of this relationship between early marriage and economic empowerment of women based on the systematic review of Nigerian and global literatures between 2015 to 2025. The study finds that early marriage has significant effective impacts in terms of reducing young women's economic agency in several overlapping channels: In reducing young women's educational attainment, in reducing their labour force participation, in reducing their decision-making, and in reducing their financial inclusion. In respect of child marriage, the evaluations of the economic cost of child marriage in Nigeria is estimated to be N10.87 billion per annum or 2.43% of the country's GDP (Fang et al. 2024). With the figures mentioned above, 78% of the girls in Northern Nigeria getting married by the age of 18 The practise occurs at a very young age (48% of the household heads in northern Nigeria were married by the age of 15) thus leading to a kind of cycle that not only pervades poverty but also of poor gender prevalence rates. The results show the lack of education - when adjusting for other characteristics such as education, pick-up, home region, and various time varying indicators - is due to the early marriage of their own education to secondary by 23% and their lifetime earnings to reduce by 12%. This paper postulates that early marriage in particular has been a critical step to opportunities in the economy that have implications and predictions on the individual development paths as well as the general context of socioeconomic development. It needs a multi-level solution which will include how cultural norms can be changed, provision of education and economic opportunities to minimise these tendencies to ensure that the economic potential of women is fulfilled in the Nigerian setting.