Preventing More 'Missing Girls' : A Review of Policies to Tackle Son Preference

In parts of Asia, the South Caucasus, and the Balkans, son preference is strong enough to trigger significant levels of sex selection, resulting in the excess mortality of girls and skewing child sex ratios in favor of boys. Every year, an estimated 1.8 million girls go “missing” because of the wide...

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Main Authors:	Kumar, Sneha, Sinha, Nistha
Format:	Journal Article
Published:	Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the World Bank 2021
Subjects:	SEX RATIOS SEX SELECTION GENDER DISCRIMINATION MISSING GIRLS SON PREFERENCE FINANCIAL INCENTIVE DIRECT INTERVENTION MORTALITY RISK
Online Access:	http://hdl.handle.net/10986/36094

id	okr-10986-36094
recordtype	oai_dc
spelling	okr-10986-360942021-08-11T05:10:38Z Preventing More 'Missing Girls' : A Review of Policies to Tackle Son Preference Kumar, Sneha Sinha, Nistha SEX RATIOS SEX SELECTION GENDER DISCRIMINATION MISSING GIRLS SON PREFERENCE FINANCIAL INCENTIVE DIRECT INTERVENTION MORTALITY RISK In parts of Asia, the South Caucasus, and the Balkans, son preference is strong enough to trigger significant levels of sex selection, resulting in the excess mortality of girls and skewing child sex ratios in favor of boys. Every year, an estimated 1.8 million girls go “missing” because of the widespread use of sex selective practices in these regions. The pervasive use of such practices is reflective of the striking inequities girls face immediately, and it also has possible negative implications for efforts to improve women's status in the long term. Recognizing this as a public policy concern, governments have employed direct measures such as banning the use of prenatal sex selection technology, and providing financial incentives to families that have girls. This study reviews cross-country experiences to take stock of the direct interventions used and finds no conclusive evidence that they are effective in reducing the higher mortality risk for girls. In fact, bans on the use of sex selection technology may inadvertently worsen the status of the very individuals they intend to protect, and financial incentives to families with girls offer only short-term benefits at most. Instead, what seems to work are policies that indirectly raise the value of daughters. The study also underscores the paucity of causal studies in this literature. 2021-08-10T15:20:15Z 2021-08-10T15:20:15Z 2020-02 Journal Article World Bank Research Observer 1564-6971 http://hdl.handle.net/10986/36094 CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 IGO http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/igo World Bank Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the World Bank Publications & Research Publications & Research :: Journal Article Europe and Central Asia Asia Eastern Europe
repository_type	Digital Repository
institution_category	Foreign Institution
institution	Digital Repositories
building	World Bank Open Knowledge Repository
collection	World Bank
topic	SEX RATIOS SEX SELECTION GENDER DISCRIMINATION MISSING GIRLS SON PREFERENCE FINANCIAL INCENTIVE DIRECT INTERVENTION MORTALITY RISK
spellingShingle	SEX RATIOS SEX SELECTION GENDER DISCRIMINATION MISSING GIRLS SON PREFERENCE FINANCIAL INCENTIVE DIRECT INTERVENTION MORTALITY RISK Kumar, Sneha Sinha, Nistha Preventing More 'Missing Girls' : A Review of Policies to Tackle Son Preference
geographic_facet	Europe and Central Asia Asia Eastern Europe
description	In parts of Asia, the South Caucasus, and the Balkans, son preference is strong enough to trigger significant levels of sex selection, resulting in the excess mortality of girls and skewing child sex ratios in favor of boys. Every year, an estimated 1.8 million girls go “missing” because of the widespread use of sex selective practices in these regions. The pervasive use of such practices is reflective of the striking inequities girls face immediately, and it also has possible negative implications for efforts to improve women's status in the long term. Recognizing this as a public policy concern, governments have employed direct measures such as banning the use of prenatal sex selection technology, and providing financial incentives to families that have girls. This study reviews cross-country experiences to take stock of the direct interventions used and finds no conclusive evidence that they are effective in reducing the higher mortality risk for girls. In fact, bans on the use of sex selection technology may inadvertently worsen the status of the very individuals they intend to protect, and financial incentives to families with girls offer only short-term benefits at most. Instead, what seems to work are policies that indirectly raise the value of daughters. The study also underscores the paucity of causal studies in this literature.
format	Journal Article
author	Kumar, Sneha Sinha, Nistha
author_facet	Kumar, Sneha Sinha, Nistha
author_sort	Kumar, Sneha
title	Preventing More 'Missing Girls' : A Review of Policies to Tackle Son Preference
title_short	Preventing More 'Missing Girls' : A Review of Policies to Tackle Son Preference
title_full	Preventing More 'Missing Girls' : A Review of Policies to Tackle Son Preference
title_fullStr	Preventing More 'Missing Girls' : A Review of Policies to Tackle Son Preference
title_full_unstemmed	Preventing More 'Missing Girls' : A Review of Policies to Tackle Son Preference
title_sort	preventing more 'missing girls' : a review of policies to tackle son preference
publisher	Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the World Bank
publishDate	2021
url	http://hdl.handle.net/10986/36094
_version_	1764484415111561216

Preventing More 'Missing Girls' : A Review of Policies to Tackle Son Preference

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