“I am the first child of my parents. I have a small brother at my home. If the first child were a son, my parents might be happy and would be confident as their future is assured by having a son. But I am a daughter. I complete all the household tasks, go to school, again do the household activities in the evening and at night only I do my school homework and I study. Despite all the activities, my parents do not give value or recognition to me. They only have praise for my brother, as he is the son.”
Girl, aged 15, Nepal
Discrimination against girls begins at birth, or even before they are born, through attitudes and patterns in behaviour passed down through generations. The disadvantage of being born a girl today includes the facts that girls are more likely to be killed in the womb and are more likely to be malnourished.
In many countries, the birth of a boy is something to be celebrated, the birth of a girl a cause for commiseration. This discrimination will have an impact at every stage of a girl or young woman¿s life.
Female foeticide
"When a son is born, Let him sleep on the bed, Clothe him with fine clothes, And give him jade to play...When a daughter is born, Let her sleep on the ground, Wrap her in common wrappings, And give broken tiles to play..."
Chinese 'Book of Songs' (1000-700 B.C.)
The desire for a male heir is so strong in some countries that it can lead to the infanticide of female babies. A recent development of this has been an increasing number of abortions of female foetuses after an ultrasound reveals their sex. Estimates of the number of `missing¿ girls and women due to such practices vary, but some are as high as 100 million.
"I got my affidavit of birth registration in 2005 thanks to Plan. I became very happy because my father kept saying that he did not have money to ensure my birth registration. The document permitted me to apply for and be admitted to sit the secondary school entrance examination. Many of my friends were rejected due to the lack of birth certificates."
Mawoussé, aged 10, Benin.
The Convention on the Rights of the Child states clearly that it is a child's right to be registered at birth. And yet 36 per cent of births are not registered. This amounts to 48 million babies who do not have a record of their right to exist
Very little of the data on infant and child mortality rates makes a distinction between girls and boys. In general, male infant and child mortality rates should be higher than female rates as girls have a biological advantage over boys.
But inadequate feeding and care can reverse this biological advantage. Where this is the case, it is often to do with gender discrimination. This is true in many parts of South Asia and in other countries as well. In Ecuador, in 2001, 132 girls died for every 108 boys in the first year of life.
