Factors Contributing to Child Labor - Coursework Example

Name : xxxxxxxxxxx Institution : xxxxxxxxxxx Course : xxxxxxxxxxx Title : Child labour Tutor : xxxxxxxxxxx @ 2009 Child labour Introduction Child labour is defined as all the economic activity for children under twelve years, any work of sufficient hours per week to undermine the health and education of those aged between twelve and fourteen years, and all hazardous work which could threaten the health of children under Eighteen. The International labour organization (ILO) defines it as some type of work done by the children under the age of eighteen. It further states that child labour occurs when a child under fifteen works full time interfering with the child education or it is dangerous to their health. Nearly all child labour occurs on the third countries, mostly in Agriculture but also in domestic service, backstreet workshops and in factory production. Though there existed a fall of over 10% in the figure since the last tally in 2000, over 24% of children within sub-Saharan Africa remain in the phase of poverty in which child labour is part. Child labour takes two forms in the third world countries, that is, bonded and non-bonded child labour. Bonded child labour is where by a child below the age of eighteen works for debt payment taken by the child or the family member without or with the child's approval, under situations that restrain his/her freedom as well as development and makes him/her susceptible to physical together with other forms of mistreatment and divest him of his fundamental rights. It is also known as debt bondage (McKechnie & Lavalette 1999). Non-bonded child labour is where by the child is working to be paid for the labour but not to pay a debt. The practices on child labour in the third countries Children have been exploited by their employers in the third world countries since 1800s. ILO involves three categories of child labour: hazardous work, non-hazardous work, and unreserved worst forms of child labour. They estimate that, from the year 2000 about 180 million children below the age of fifteen years engage in non-hazardous work. This work allows maximum of fourteen hours weekly for children aging between 5 and 12 years. It also allows forty three hours weekly for those above twelve years. Hazardous work is the works that outdo these figures and results to bad effects on the health of the child and his/ her moral development. It is estimated that about 111 million children fall under this category, almost 60% of children who are economically active which is estimated to include 211 million children between five to fourteen years. Nevertheless, there exist more girls compared to boys in these categories. Lastly, in the unconditional worst form, forced and bonded labour is included. There is also prostitution, armed conflict involvements, pornography and illicit activities. A conventional tallying by the ILO approximates that more than eight million of kids below eighteen years of age are entails in these types of activities. Today, the number of child workers in sub-Saharan Africa has decreased to 2.5 million yet many Brazilians privately ridicule efforts to end child labour. They say that even the United States tried to fight this problem in rural areas but did not achieve much as some American children are used to twelve hour workdays. Child labour is so embedded in Brazil that parents rarely condemn the government for not providing better jobs or adequate schooling. Instead, they provide support to parents. These children ranged between 10 to 15 years. De Jesus argues that he did not feel oppressed by the owner of the sisal farm who employed his children. He says that if the children did not work they could have gone hungry (Mofford 2003). Child labour is also practiced when children works in their families’ business or farm. This form of child labour takes a large group of children though it is rarely regarded as child labour as parents argues that the children are assisting but at the end the child is over worked and does not go to school resulting to child labour. However, conditions and distribution of child labour vary from one place to another. Studies based on living standard surveys in 1990 shows that children, particularly boys, in third world countries contribute substantially to their families' income: one-fourth of household earnings in Pakistan, one- third in Ghana and only one-tenth in Peru. These children works and do not attend school. Such families are completely dependent on their working children and thus susceptible to reduction in their children's access to jobs. In family units whereby kids work and at the same time go to school, they are normally better of and depend less on the income of the child. In some regions the existing tradition is that children combine work and school, whereas in others girls do neither. This is generally because they are too busy with domestic duties. Based on estimates from UNICEF, United Nations' International Labour Organization, and United States Department of Labour and Human Rights Watch; more than 250 million children between 5 to 14 years from poor families in developing nations work. In India 20 to 50 million, Bangladesh 6.6 million, Peru 4 million, Pakistan 3.3 million, Brazil 2.5 million, Egypt 2 million, Philippines 1.8 million, Turkey 1.5 million, Mexico 1.1 million, Kenya 1 million, Guatemala 900,000, South Africa 200,000. According to statistics, 70% of child labour occurs in Agriculture, forestry, fishing and hunting, Manufacturing 8%, Wholesale and retail 8%Community, social and personal services 7%, Transport and communications 4%, Construction 2%, and Mining and quarrying 1%. Factors contributing to child Labour Poverty is the major of child labour. This is confirmed by the United Kingdom Committee for UNICEF. Third world countries are very poor countries and are densely populated and this is why most cases of child Labour occur in these countries. The countries have large numbers of children compared to adults. Therefore children make up most of the labour force. Due to high demands of jobs and low supply of jobs there is pulling off kids into the market in search of jobs. Poverty in the third world countries has led to high demands of jobs resulting to families having no choice but to send their children out to work in fields or factories. Inadequate education has also contributed to child labour. Most schools in the third world countries are very expensive, not easily accessible and of poor quality. Bearing in mind that poverty is dominant in these countries it is impossible for the children to access education. Cultural pressures have also led to negative view of the value of education mainly for girl child. Consequently there is minimal or no girl child education (Kathlyn 1998). Another reason for child labour is Migration. Rural-urban migration has resulted to child labour in that migrants take jobs that people living in urban areas do not want for low wages. These jobs are mainly done by children resulting to child labour. Lack of employment has resulted to child labour in the third world countries. Most of the people in these countries are unemployed forcing them to work for low wages. Due to the high ratio of children compared to adults, children are forced by their unemployed parents to work so as to get their daily bread. Lack of sufficient work regulations have also led to child labour. Lack of regulations against child labour in these countries has resulted to children doing a lot of labour for cheap wages. Employers are not afraid when overworking and underpaying these children as there are no laws and regulations against the act. Conversely, the existing regulations are not implemented. For example, Brazil has been having anti-child labour laws on its books since 1891. But the government, corporations, and society have ignored them. Children between seven and fourteen years have ended up working in almost every industry, from fruit picking to shoemaking to charcoal production. By 1996, about three million Brazilian youngsters were already working (Greene 1992). Lastly, high demand for cheap labour has contributed highly to child labour. As previously discussed, high demands of jobs and low supply of them is pulling off kids into the market for cheap labour. How to eliminate child labour In order to eliminate child labour, Government has been keen to tackle this problem through strict enforcement of legislative provisions together with simultaneous rehabilitative measures. State Governments, being the appropriate implementing authorities, have been conducting regular inspections and search to detect cases of violations. Since poverty is the main cause of this problem and enforcement alone cannot help solve it, government has been laying a lot of prominence on the rehabilitation of these children and on improving the economic conditions of their families. This should be encouraged by both the public and private sectors in these countries by investing in the rural areas in order to create jobs and eradicate poverty. This will also create a ready market for the local products. For instance a tourism hotel in the rural areas will attract tourists in these areas who will buy the art crafts and souvenirs from the local people. At the same time, in the running of this hotel, local products like milk, cereals and vegetables will be needed creating market for these products. This will not only eradicate poverty but will also lead to employment as most local people will be employed in these organizations and those selling their products will be self employed (Hine & Freedman 1998). This will eliminate child labour as their families will have a source of income and will not force their children to work but instead will send them to school as they will be having enough money. Government should also create enough jobs so as to control the jobs demands and supply in developing countries (Mofford 2003). The government should have laws and regulations against child labour and ensure the implementation of these laws. It should also have a law governing all parents in that any parent found with a child less than eighteen years at home and not attending school should be punished accordingly. There should also be sufficient work regulations where by employers should not employer children below eighteen years. The recommendations of Gurupadaswamy Committee show that the enactment of Child Labour Prohibition & Regulation Act occurred in 1986. The Act discourages employment of children in specified hazardous work and processes while regulating the working conditions in others (Abbot 1938).  However, there is an increment in the expansion in the number of hazardous occupations and processes on the recommendations of Child Labour Technical Advisory committee in the Act. In consonance with the above approach, a National Policy on Child Labour was formulated in 1987. The Policy looks for adoption of a gradual as well as chronological approach with a focus on rehabilitation of children who work in hazardous situations and processes. The Action Plan outlined in the Policy for tackling this problem is as follows:  Legislative Action Plan for strict enforcement of Child Labour Act and other labour laws to ensure that children are not employed in hazardous employments, and that the working conditions of children working in non-hazardous areas are regulated in accordance with the provisions of the Child Labour Act. It also involves supplementary identification of added occupations as well as processes, which are unfavourable to the health and safety of the children (Grootaert & Kanbur 1995). Another plan is focusing of General Developmental Programmes for Benefiting Child Labour. As poverty is the basis of child labour, the action plan needs to emphasize on the need to facilitate the needs of the children together with their families. They are supposed to be under various poverty mitigation and employment invention schemes of the Government. Lastly Project Based Plan of Action foresees starting of projects within the areas of high application of child labour. To achieve this, in 1988, the National Child Labour Project (NCLP) Scheme was launched in nine districts of high child labour in the country. The Scheme foresees the running of special schools for children who have been withdrawn from work. In the schools that are special, these children are given formal as well as non-formal education coupled with vocational training, a recompense of Rs.100 monthly, continuous health check ups and additional nutrition in order to prepare them to attend regular mainstream schools. In this scheme, money is issued to the District Collectors for proper running of special schools for child labour. Mostly, NGOS runs these in the district. The United Nations and the children organization have adopted long term strategies that intend to help ease the issues of poverty, illiteracy and employment, hence implementing governmental issues like the right to education, right to work and the fixation of the international minimum wage (Jillian 1997). Rural-urban migration should also be discouraged. This has led to child labour as discussed earlier and should be eliminated. Families living in rural settings should make use of the resources available in these areas rather than migrate to urban areas and force their children to work for the lesser paid job. The entire children who are below the age of eighteen should go to school. Lack of education has led to a lot to child labour and should be discouraged. This will be made possible by making the schools to be cheap so as for the poor families to afford and also they should be accessible and of high quality. This will be achieved if only the government move in and deliver free education in both primary and secondary schools in these countries or alternatively reduce the school fee to the amount that the poor families will afford (McKechnie & Lavalette 1999) Planning on how to eliminate child labour On planning on how to eliminate child labour, strategy under the 10th plan is applied. The plan was evaluated by independent agencies in coordination with V. V. Giri National Labour Institute in 2001. It aimed at greater convergence with the other developmental plans and bringing qualitative changes in the plan. The following are the salient points of the 10th Plan Strategy: Expansion of National Child Labour Projects to 150 districts, Convergence with other plans of the Departments of Education, Rural Development, Health and Women and Child Development for the ultimate attainment of the objective in a time bound manner, Focused and reinforced action to eliminate child labour in the hazardous occupations by the end of the Plan period, Linking the child labour elimination efforts with the Scheme of Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan of Ministry of Human Resource Development to ensure that children in the age group of 5-8 years get directly admitted to regular schools and that the older working children are mainstreamed to the formal education system through special schools functioning under the NCLP Scheme (National consumers’ League 1905). The Ministry of Labour and Employment together with the general Government are very strict in their efforts to fight and win in the elimination of child labour. There has been an increase in the number of districts found under the NCLP Scheme to 250. Besides, twenty one districts have been included in a Scheme for analysis of child labour together with United State Department of Labour. Mr. Steven Law reviewed the implementation of this project. He is the Deputy Secretary of State, from the United State of America. Government is issuing funds to the NGOs under the Ministry’s Grants-in-aid plan for running unique Schools for analysis of child labour for the district not included in these two schemes, thereby providing for a greater role and cooperation of the civil society in combating this menace (Hindman 2002). Despite an increment in the number of districts in this plan, the concern of the government is portrayed in the quantum jump in the allocation of the budget in the 10th Plan. The execution of NCLP Scheme is closely done through reports, regular visits as well as meetings with the District and officials of the State Government. The Government’s commitment to achieve concrete results in this direction in a time bound manner is evident from the fact that in the recent Regional Level Conferences of District Collectors held in Pune, Hyderabad, Mussoorie and Kolkata district-wise review of the Scheme was conducted at the level of Secretary. The conference gave an excellent opportunity to have a direct interaction with the collectors who ensures the implementation of these schemes in the district. Besides, these conferences contributed a lot in early operational of Scheme in the newly selected districts. The government is very much involved in the elimination of child labour and it’s moving in this direction in a targeted manner. The strategy being followed by the government to achieve this objective also found its boom during the recent discussions held in parliament on the private member’s Bill tabled by Shri Igbal Ahmed Saradgi. The Government has realized that multipronged and concerted effort to terminate child labour will bring in desired results. Conclusion Child labour permeates every part of third world countries and is a non-stop part of the social milieu arising out of poverty and lack of opportunity. However, this should not encourage child labour but find other alternatives to fight to end the cataclysms caused by the oppression of a child's fundamental rights. Child labour has many negative impacts on the children giving that form of labour. This is because the child labourers work in extremely harsh conditions for long periods of time and are paid low wages. They are sometimes locked in dark rooms and even chained as prisoners. Some are kidnapped and later sold as slaves. Therefore, child labour needs to be treated as a social problem, and mechanisms to collect data and monitor child labour need to be created immediately. The worst type of child labour should be terminated so as to prevent children from working in harsh conditions.. At the same time, child labour has contributed to the reason why third world countries remain third world countries. Child Labour is mainly accompanied by high child death rates, poverty and low life expectancy. In most countries, children’s are the future and practicing child labour destroys this future. Third world countries cannot develop its full potential if they do not stop child labour. Educating children in third world countries will help eliminate poverty and child labour at the same time. Bibliography Abbot, G., 1938, Legal Status in the Family, Apprenticeship and Child Labour, volume 1, Greenwood, New York. Greene, L., 1992, Child labour: then and now: Impact Book F. Watts. Grootaert, C. & Kanbur S. M., 1995, Child labour: a review, World Bank. California. Hindman, H. D., 2002, Child labour: an American history, M.E. Sharpe, New Jersey. Hine, L.W. & Freedman R., 1998, Kids at Work: Lewis Hine and the Crusade against Child Labour, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Washington DC. Jillian, A., 1997, Child labour: the legal aspects, Volume 1,SPARC, Michigan. Kathlyn, G., 1998, Child labour: a global crisis Single Titles Series, Millbrook, New York. McKechnie, J. & Lavalette M., 1999, Child labour: a world history companion, Volume 5. ABC-CLIO Publishers, Harvard University Press. Mofford, J. H., 2003, Child Labour in America, Bt Bound, California. National consumers’ League, 1905, Child Labour legislature: Schedules of Existing statutes and the standards, National Consumers' League, Michigan. Read More