Break Free! Zambia SUMMARY
Millions of young people don’t have access to appropriate, gender-responsive, quality SRHR education, information and services. This makes them vulnerable to unintended pregnancies, often followed by child marriage (CM). The Break Free! programme empowers adolescents and young people to make their own free and informed choices to speak out and have control over their SRH and lives. BF! is tackling root causes of gender inequality,  unequal power relations and discriminatory social norms, systems, structures, policies and practices, supported by civil society and improved legislation. The project will be implemented between 2021 and 2025 by the Break Free! Consortium consisting of Plan International Netherlands, SAT and FAWE, technical partners KIT and RMT in collaboration with Netherlands’ Embassies. It will be carried out in Ethiopia, Kenya, Sudan, Zambia, Malawi, Mozambique, Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger and a regional Pan-African component to sustain the country programmes. Being married generally carries high social status in the patriarchal society of Zambia. 
Almost one third (29%) of women (age 20–24)are married before 18.  Teenage pregnancy (TP) prevalence is 30.9% under 18 and under customary law there is no minimum age of consent to marry.
Traditional practices and social norms socialise girls to prepare for marriage and are key factors influencing their decision to get married. These gender roles and expectations make negotiating safer sex challenging for girls and also means that education is not prioritised for girls. 
Parents often turn a blind eye to their children’s SRH and risky behaviour and, in many instances, support decisions around transactional sex, child labour and early marriage due to the economic benefits they bring to the family. 
Lockdown restrictions and enforcement of COVID-19 prevention methods have led to an increase in harmful practices such as CEFMU reducing the effectiveness of referral pathways for essential services, and resulting in poorer SRH outcomes for girls. The loss of employment and income by parents and caregivers is expected to increase girls’ school dropout and girls’ vulnerability to sexual exploitation, resulting in TP and Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs), including HIV. 
SRH services are often not tailored for youth aged 10–24 years and relevant and good quality information and education is still lacking and often do not reach out-of-school youth and youth with disabilities. SRH education still focuses on messages of abstinence until marriage. Adolescents under 16 cannot access services without the consent of their parents. Empowering adolescents to claim their SRHR rights, supported by civil society, will be achieved if  CSOs, youth-led groups and networks are strengthened to lobby and advocate for improved legislation and to promote social norm change in favour of the prevention of CEFMU/TP. 
Education opportunities and a community supportive of girls’ education will stimulate adolescent girls at risk of TP/CEFMU to access and remain in school, while promoting the re-entrance of girls who have discontinued school due to pregnancy. In order to create a supportive and improved socio-cultural environment that promotes education for girls and SRHR for young people, relevant gate keepers, teachers and parents will be made aware of the importance of adopting attitudes favourable to keeping girls in school. 
Supporting CSOs to organise, participate and communicate enables CSOs to claim better education and SRHR outcomes for girls and young women, and influence decision-making processes. Duty bearers and decision-makers are made aware of and encouraged to take action to fulfil the education needs of girls based on the effective lobby and advocacy of civil society. Decision-makers at local, national, regional and continental level will be sensitized to build linkages between the levels resulting that civil society is able to elevate issues to higher decision-making levels, and vice versa, they can hold lower-level policy makers and duty bearers accountable for implementing decisions taken at higher levels. This will be enabled by establishing participation and accountability mechanisms between decision-makers/duty bearers and civil society with the support of enhanced youth agency. The programme is a.o. based upon the results and findings of the 18+ ECM ( 2014-2015) and YID programme (2015-2020), implemented by Plan in Zambia and 6 other countries, combined with experience of FAWE and SAT’s programmes on this theme. All partners have experience on improving legislation and policies on CEFMU and implementation thereof, through L&A and enhancing adolescent’s skills to claim their SRH rights, quality of SRH education, information and service provision. This resulted a.o. into the development of the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) Model Law on Eradicating Child Marriage, served as legal framework for national law and policy-makers and was used as civil society (CS) advocacy tool across the SADC region. It resulted as well in strengthened CSOs, youth hubs and girls clubs, which have become promoters of ASRHR. 

CSOs play a critical role in monitoring policy implementation and service delivery in Zambia.
Decision-makers are open to CSOs participating in political decision-making on SRHR, CM and TP but politicians’ political agendas sometimes hinder progress on policy and programmes.Religious communities that participate in L&A initiatives are often barrier for advancing ASRHR as it is believed to promote immoral behaviour. Unless the enabling environment for CSOs to participate in decision-making, stronger advocacy strategy and accountability mechanism for implementing policies and commitments is needed. While teachers follow up on girls who are absent, they is no follow up on pregnant girls to ensure that they return to school. Programmes and support are not geared towards emotionally and practically supporting teenage mothers to go back to school and so, there is little hope of girls bouncing back after pregnancy and CM.