What kind of future do we wish to create for Asia and the Pacific?

Author: Roberta Clarke, Gwang-Jo Kim, Daniel Toole and Yoriko Yasukawa

The answer to that sweeping question, in large part, lies in how we care for the girls of today — in particular the more than 325 million girls aged 10-19 across our region.

We pose this question at a crucial time, when our region — and our world — are embarking on the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted by the United Nations last month, which seeks to achieve a life of dignity for all, leaving no one behind.

By 2030, the adolescent girls of today will form a significant proportion of the workforce — leaders, innovators, teachers. Many will also be mothers and caregivers for a new generation. But many others could be left behind, unless we create opportunities for them to craft their own future.

Imagine a girl standing at the fork of a road.

One branch will make it more likely that she can fulfil her potential — school and higher education, gainful employment, adult marriage to a partner who will love and respect her, healthy children, the ability to invest resources for the well-being of her children and, ultimately, a secure old age.

The other branch, however, makes it harder and adds to the risks she faces — child marriage, leaving school, early and unwanted pregnancies, unsafe childbirth, violence and abuse, informal and erratic employment, a hostile home life and possible displacement, and an insecure old age.

If each adolescent girl receives a quality education, there will be fewer child deaths, less malnutrition, and less teen pregnancy and child marriage. Our workforce will be more productive, our economies will be sounder, our countries will be stronger and our societies more caring.

We ignore the needs and education of adolescent girls at our peril. And if we continue to do so, everyone in our region and in our world — communities, businesses, families, children — will suffer.

But for adolescent girls to be the formidable force for good we need them to be, they need support to overcome inequalities and discrimination on several fronts.

At present far too many across Asia and the Pacific are constrained by social norms, deeply-rooted gender roles and outright discrimination — including a widespread preference for boys over girls.

Too often girls are aborted before they are born or even killed at birth, fed more poorly than boys, kept out of school, forced to marry in childhood, suffer violence at their partners' hands, excluded from decent employment and marginalised in old age.

Women and girls often act as first responders on the front lines in global crises, holding their communities and families together. Consequently, they are often more affected than men and boys by economic upheaval, poverty, food insecurity, climate change and lack of health care.

For their sakes — and for ours as a whole — we need to ensure that adolescent girls are not invisible.

Services and programmes must target the specific needs of girls aged 10-19, and address the barriers and disadvantages adolescent girls face.

Services and programmes must also be underpinned with the realisation that adolescent girls are not just recipients of interventions and support, but are recognised as agents of development and change.

Laws prohibiting discrimination in all forms must be passed and enforced.

Investing in adolescent girls is not just fair or right or decent — it’s also smart.

The evidence is clear. Interventions that improve the health, safety, education and the lives of the millions of girls and young women in the Asia-Pacific region will also significantly improve all our lives, especially those of our children and grandchildren — female and male alike.

On this International Day of the Girl Child, on the cusp of the era of the 2030 Global Goals, we have a duty to secure their rights to education, health, protection and participation — governments, civil society and United Nations agencies alike.

Invest in and support education, skills training and access to information technology to transform the lives of adolescent girls and prepare them for life, jobs and leadership.

Provide adolescent girls with age-specific information and services on puberty, menstrual hygiene management, nutrition and sexual and reproductive health.

Enact and consistently implement policies to protect adolescent girls from any form of violence, child marriage, trafficking and sexual exploitation.

Help girls to be the women they can be, so the world can have the future we want.