Efforts to Eradicate Child Marriage Practices in Indonesia: Towards Sustainable Development Goals

Child marriage in Indonesia is a reality recurring within society. Religious and customary laws often become the basis to legitimize the practices of child marriage. According to UNICEF in 2016, Indonesia ranked the seventh in the world and the second in ASEAN for the highest rate of child marriage. Child marriage is a manifestation of gender inequality, especially for female. Indonesia, as one of the member countries of the United Nations (UN), has ratified the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) program issued by the UN to eradicate the practice of child marriage occurring within the society. One of the purposes of the SGDs program is to “Achieve Gender Equality and Empower All Women and Girls.” Hence, it is expected that from this program, Indonesia will have a zero rate of child marriage by 2030. This article discusses child marriage practices occurring in Indonesia as well as efforts taken by the Indonesian Government (both the central government and regional government) in an attempt to eradicate the problem of child marriage