Colombia outlaws child marriage after 17-year campaign

Story: 2024 C.E.  |  Last updated: April 28, 2026

After 17 years of advocacy, eight failed legislative attempts, and five hours of heated debate, Colombia’s lawmakers voted to ban marriage for anyone under 18. The bill — called They are Girls, Not Wives — closes a 137-year loophole in the country’s civil code that had allowed minors to marry with parental consent. Colombia now joins 11 other countries in Latin America and the Caribbean that have fully prohibited child marriage.

At a glance

• Child marriage ban: Colombia’s new law prohibits marriage for anyone under 18, ending a legal provision that dated back to 1887 and allowed minors to wed with parental approval.
• Scale of the problem: An estimated 4.5 million girls and women in Colombia were married before age 18 — roughly one in four — and one million were married before age 15, according to UNICEF.
• Legislative persistence: Advocacy groups and co-authors like congresswoman Jennifer Pedraza pushed the bill through eight previous failed attempts before it finally passed in 2024 C.E.

A 137-year loophole finally closed

Colombia’s civil code had allowed under-18s to marry with parental consent since 1887 C.E. A separate provision also recognized an informal marital union when minors cohabited for two years — a rule that critics said made exploitation easier to normalize and harder to prosecute.

Rights organizations had long argued that Colombia, as a signatory to international conventions on violence against women, was legally obligated to eliminate these exceptions. Sandra Ramirez, adviser in Latin America for the advocacy group Equality Now, said the new law “aligns Colombian law with international standards and guarantees the full protection of the rights of girls and adolescents.”

The bill’s passage was not smooth. Previous attempts were blocked by legislators citing tradition and parental rights. Many representatives of Colombia’s more than 100 Indigenous communities also opposed it — a tension that reflects genuine complexity in reconciling legal standards with community autonomy and self-determination.

Why girls bear the heaviest cost

Rates of child marriage are about three times higher for girls than for boys. Children living in poverty and in rural or Indigenous communities are disproportionately affected.

Marta Royo, executive director of Profamilia, a nonprofit promoting reproductive health services, described the cultural forces at work: “We live in an extremely patriarchal society where there is a deep division between what a man wants and a girl wants. In many areas we have a role in life and that role is simply to be mothers, it doesn’t matter at how early an age.”

Research has consistently linked child marriage to early pregnancy, higher rates of death in childbirth, school dropout, and domestic violence. Senator María José Pizarro, one of the bill’s supporters, put it plainly: “These girls abandon everything. Their studies, their life project and their possibility to construct a life for them and their children ends completely.”

Decades of internal armed conflict, entrenched poverty, and narco-culture’s influence on gender norms had kept prevalence rates stubbornly high even as Colombia saw broader social and economic development in other areas.

What the law requires next

The legislation does more than prohibit the act — it also requires that policies addressing the root causes of child marriage, including education programs, be introduced and implemented. That provision matters because a legal ban alone rarely changes behavior embedded in poverty, geography, and cultural expectations.

“This is a historic moment but a lot of challenges remain ahead,” Ramirez said. “Public policy now will be crucial, as a change in legislation means little without effective implementation and ensuring that the voices of girls and adolescents are at the centre.”

Colombia’s UNICEF country office has called for sustained investment in girls’ education and economic opportunity as the most reliable long-term protections against the practice. Girls Not Brides, the global partnership of civil society organizations, notes that legal reform is most effective when paired with community engagement, especially in rural and Indigenous areas where enforcement is difficult and trust in state institutions is low.

Congresswoman Jennifer Pedraza, who co-authored the bill and helped lead the 17-year campaign, framed the vote in terms that reached beyond Colombia’s borders: “So we are very happy that Colombia has just left the shameful list of countries that allow childhood marriage.” Her coalition’s persistence — through eight rejections spanning multiple congressional sessions and governments — is now part of the regional record that other advocates can point to.

Colombia joins Honduras, Puerto Rico, Mexico, and the Dominican Republic among the 12 out of 33 Latin American and Caribbean nations to have fully banned child and forced marriage. The remaining 21 countries still allow marriage under 18 in at least some circumstances — a reminder that this fight, for all its momentum, is far from over across the region.

Read more

For more on this story, see: The Guardian

For more from Good News for Humankind, see:

• Indigenous land rights milestone: 160 million hectares recognized ahead of COP30
• Renewables now make up at least 49% of global power capacity
• The Good News for Humankind archive on Colombia

About this article

• 🤖 This article is AI-generated, based on a framework created by Peter Schulte.
• 🌍 It aims to be inspirational but clear-eyed, accurate, and evidence-based, and grounded in care for the Earth, peace and belonging for all, and human evolution.
• 💬 Leave your notes and suggestions in the comments below — I will do my best to review and implement where appropriate.
• ✉️ One verified piece of good news, one insight from Antihero Project, every weekday morning. Subscribe free.