Many children work…after school hour’s children can help with household chores, fetch water, run errands, or look after their younger brothers and sisters. In this way they can participate in family life.
Child labour implies something different – that children are doing things that are harmful to their healthy development. They may be labouring long hours, sacrificing time and energy that they might have spent at school or at home, enjoying the free and formative experience of childhood.
How many child labourers are there? There will never be a definitive answer to this question, given inconsistencies in national standards and definitions as well as weaknesses in data collection. The most comprehensive global statistics on child labour come from the ILO (international labour organisation), which estimated that in 2002,the number of children worldwide who were “economically active” amounted to 352 million;of these 211 million were aged 5-14, the ILO counted 246 million as child labourers”. The majority of them work in agriculture with 70% of child workers; this is followed by 8% working in manufacturing and a further 8% in wholesale and retail trade, restaurants, hotels, and in various services. But one of the most important questions is: why children work?
Primarly because the environment they live in has failed to protect them from exploitation and a large number of factors interact to influence whether or not children will be working.these include:
Persistent poverty
Economic shocks
Inadequate education
The demand for child labour
Girls are often employed inside private houses rather than in factories or in public, their exploitation tends to have been invisible, making them even more vulnerable. Unvalued as human beings, girls are often treated as objects to be used and abused for domestic labour or for sex.
Girls who escape work outside the home may instead be kept away from school in order to work for their own families. Despite the large number of girls who are in employment, parents and employers in many societies still consider that the most appropriate place of work for them is at home. The latest ILO Convention on Worst Forms of Child Labour lays special emphasis on the plight of the girl child and, by making a pointed reference to her problems, it urges nations to take a closer look at the not so visible circumstances of her work.
The HIV/AIDS pandemic has regenerated the supply side of the child labour equation. Households where adult members suffer prolonged periods of illness with HIV and related conditions suffer dramatic cuts in income and forced sales of assets. To make up for these economic losses, children may be withdrawn from school and put to work.
Africa in particular has in the last decade seen a dramatic rise in the new phenomenon of child-headed households, brought on by HIV/AIDS mortality. It is estimated that over 7% of Zambian households are without any adult member; headed instead by a boy or a girl aged 14 or under. An estimated 10% of all children orphaned by HIV in Africa are heads of households and caring for siblings.
Several African governments have instituted reductions in, or elimination of, school fees for orphaned children. However, little has been done to implement and strengthen programs, policies or legislation to reduce the risk of AIDS orphans drawn into hazardous forms of work.
The concentrated use of child labour in certain highly visible industries (Nike, Puma, Timberland and so on) has, in some cases, attracted intense media attention and ultimately succesful public campaigns for governments to legislate and phase out the use of child labour. Trade sanctions have been frequently used as a tool to fight child labour; the effectiveness of trade sanctions is however highly questionable in their priority for political demonstration that “something is being made” ahead of addressing the root causes of child labour. Effective solutions to child labour must be based on the reduction of chronic poverty through broadbase economic and social development, with a strong emphasis on human resource development.
Resources:
www.unicef.org
www.us.oneworld.net
www.unhchr.ch
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