1 Effect of Early marriage on fertility and women empowerment outcomes: Evidence from selected Eastern Africa Countries By: Gideon RUTAREMWA 1 and Allen KABAGENYI 2 Abstract This paper uses data from recent Demographic and Health Surveys data from five East African countries of Burundi (2010), Kenya (2008/09), Rwanda (2010), Tanzania (2010) and Uganda (2011) to explore the link between female empowerment and total fertility via early marriage, defined as marriage before age 18. Early marriage directly impacts on fertility by increasing the duration of exposure to conception and childbearing. At the same time, it exposes the young woman to physical consequences of early sex and pregnancy; a disrupted education; and reduced autonomy and bargaining power. This study seeks to analyze using appropriate regression procedures, first the effect of early marriage on a woman’s fertility and second, the empowerment effect of early marriage. Attention will be paid to discussing the endogeneity and heterogeneity impact of current age and marital duration. The findings of this study will be helpful in identifying effective women empowerment channel. Key words: Eastern Africa, Early marriage, Fertility, Women Empowerment, and Bargaining Power Introduction While progress towards implementation has been made at global, regional and national levels, continuing and new challenges require that high priority be given to SRHR for all, particularly women and girls in the United Nations post-2015 development agenda (Germain, Sen, Garcia- Moreno, & Shankar, 2015). Successful implementation of the SDGs and agenda 2063 by the will require an understanding of various factors that relate to and impact on development. A number of social, economic and health outcomes are associated with early marriage(Jain & Kurz, 2007; Santhya et al., 2010; UNICEF, 2005). For example, early marriage tends to curtail young women's educational opportunities, and those who marry early tend to have low levels of educational attainment(International Center for Diahoeal Disease Research, 2007; Lloyd & Mensch, 2006). Likewise, studies in diverse settings have found that females who marry at young ages may be less capable than those who marry later of asserting themselves in their marriage, which may place them at higher risk of experiencing physical and sexual violence. Marriage has traditionally been early and universal in sub-Saharan Africa and this has been blamed for high fertility and the failure among other things to achieve most MDGs (Ayiga & Rampagane, 2013; Rutaremwa, 2014).Fertility reduction is often associated with improved status of women, particularly, free partner choice, women's education and wealth of the family (Larsen & Hollos, 2003).Studies in low-income countries have shown that women's empowerment (i.e. the freedom of women to exercise their judgment in order to act for their own interests) influences a number of other reproductive and child health outcomes (Mistry, Galal, &Lu, 2009). There are therefore arguments adopted in literature that that higher fertility rates might be 1 Gideon RUTAREMWA – e-Mail: GRutaremwa@uneca.org ECA Social Development Policy Division, P.O.Box 3001, Addis Ababa - Ethiopia 2 Allen KABAGENYI –e-Mail: akabagenyi@bams.mak.ac.ug Department of Population Studies – Makerere University, Kampala - Uganda