By delaying adolescent pregnancy, India could add an estimated 12 per cent to it’s GDP, stated a report ‘Collaborative Force: Empowering 10 to 19’. The report further states that girls with secondary schooling are up to six times less likely to be married as children. It added each additional year of schooling for girls reduces infant mortality for their offspring by up to 10 per cent; and for every USD 1 spent on key interventions for reproductive, maternal, new born and child health, about USD 20 could be generated as benefits.
Mumbai : By delaying adolescent pregnancy, India could add USD 400 billion to their GDP, an estimated 12 per cent to India’s GDP, stated a report ‘Collaborative Force: Empowering 10 to 19’. This report was jointly launched by Bank of America and Dasra, a Non-Governmental Organisation.
Both have been jointly launching various reports on teenage girls for the last three years. This year the report urged for adaptation of collaborative models to address India’s large-scale development challenges. The report further states that girls with secondary schooling are up to six times less likely to be married as children. It added each additional year of schooling for girls reduces infant mortality for their offspring by up to 10 per cent; and for every USD 1 spent on key interventions for reproductive, maternal, new born and child health, about USD 20 could be generated as benefits.
This report is an add-on to the initiative–‘10to19, launched in 2017. Every year, mission ‘10to19’ will touch lives of five million adolescent girls. This initiative is about successful transition of adolescents to adulthood.
‘10to19’ will be a platform that will bring together funders, technical experts, the government and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) to address issues of young girls. This initiative will be supported by various entities and would require USD 50 million investment for next five years.
Kaku Nakhate, President and India Country Head, Bank of America said, “The well-documented report suggests that if properly structured and adequately resourced, collaboratives have the potential to produce results with multiplier effect and play a vital role in advancing India’s development agenda.” She also added after Indian government’s two per cent CSR mandate, Bank of America decided to dive deep down and work with NGOs that created an impact. At present Bank of America and Dasra, have jointly worked in Jharkhand and Maharashtra.
With a clear vision to be involved in education, arts and culture, sanitation and renewables, ‘10to19’ is expected to help girls to join in building a stronger country.