Categories

Programmes and Projects (1)

Links

Girls in Mining  new

Research carried out by the International Labour Organization’s International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (ILO–IPEC) between April and December 2006 has produced evidence that girls as well as boys are involved in hazardous work in the small-scale mining industry. This report explores those issues unique to girls forced to work in mines.

http://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/---dgreports/---gender/documents/publication/wcms_090521.pdf

(Added: Fri Jul 11 2008   Hits: 34)

Africa adds to miserable ranks of child workers

Across the globe, the number of children forced to work is in sharp decline. But sub-Saharan Africa is the exception. Here, more than one in four children below age 14 works, whether full time or for a few hours a week, nearly the same percentage as the worldwide average in 1960. Their tasks are not merely the housework and garden-tending common to most developing societies. They are prostitutes, miners, construction workers, pesticide sprayers, haulers, street vendors, full-time servants, and they are not necessarily even paid for their labor. Some are as young as 5 and 6 years old. This article tells some of their stories. (Michael Wines, The New York Times, 24 August 2006)

http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/08/24/africa/web.0824zambia.php

(Added: Thu Nov 09 2006   Hits: 53)

My week with the rubbish-children of Peru

Two million children - starting at three or four - are forced to work in Peru, some never leaving the rubbish dump, or the stone quarry, where they make their maegre living. This author spends some time with them, as well as a determined band of Peruvian heroes, supported by Sport Relief, a British charity, who work to get children out of work - something made difficult by the dicates of the IMF. (Johann Hari, the Independent, 14 July 2006)

http://www.johannhari.com/archive/article.php?id=924

(Added: Fri Jul 21 2006   Hits: 95)

Are Fair Trade labels effective against child labour?

This paper develops a model of North-South trade to analyze the impact of a label certifying the absence of child labour in the export production of the South. When most eligible producers in the South can obtain the label, its impact is considerably reduced by a displacement effect whereby adult workers replace children in the export sector while children replace adults in the domestic sector (Jean-Marie Baland & Cédric Duprez, 27 March 2007).

http://www.eudnet.net/download/wp/EUDN2007_01.pdf

(Added: Thu Dec 20 2007   Hits: 47)

Child Labor Coalition (US)

The Child Labor Coalition (CLC) exists to serve as a national network for the exchange of information about child labor; provide a forum and a unified voice on protecting working minors and ending child labor exploitation; and develop informational and educational outreach to the public and private sectors to combat child labor abuses and promote progressive initiatives and legislation.

http://www.natlconsumersleague.org/clc.htm

(Added: Fri Dec 14 2001   Modified: Mon Nov 14 2005   Hits: 96)

Child Labour and its Impact on Children's Access to and Participation in Primary Education: a case study from Tanzania [PDF]

By H.A. Dachi and R.M. Garrett. An educational paper published by the Department for International Development: Educational Papers. This is study into child labour is a preliminary investigation into the lives of those children who work hard both at their education and who make an invaluable contribution to the economy of their homes and the locality in which they live. It aims to gain an understanding of the contextual factors that determines children's access to, and participation in, primary schooling or the demand for their labour.

http://www.dfid.gov.uk/pubs/files/childlabouranditsimpactedpaper48.pdf

(Added: Mon Aug 08 2005   Modified: Tue Dec 13 2005   Hits: 65)

Child Workers in Asia

Child Workers in Asia (CWA) was established in 1985 as a support group for child workers in Asia, and the NGOs working with them. From a small group of five organizations, it now brings together over 50 groups/organizations working on child labour in 14 countries. It facilitates sharing of expertise and experiences between NGOs and strengthens their collaboration to jointly respond to the exploitation of working children in the region.

http://www.cwa.tnet.co.th/

(Added: Fri Dec 14 2001   Modified: Mon Nov 14 2005   Hits: 103)

China: End Child Labor in State Schools

Background information from Human Rights Watch on the practice of 'Work and Study' programmes that operate in many state schools in China (Human Rights Watch, 3 December 2007).

http://www.dev-zone.org/downloads/end%20child%20labor%20in%20state%20school.doc

(Added: Tue Dec 11 2007   Hits: 99)

Contract farming in India : impact on women and children

International Institute for Environment and Development Natural Resources Group and Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Livelihoods Programme (2003). Written by Sukhpal Singh. This paper draws on case studies of hybrid cottonseed production in Andhra Pradesh and vegetable farming in Punjab to examine the labour conditions in contract farming in India. It discusses how workers employed by contract producers tend to experience poor terms and conditions, especially women workers, and there is an increasing incidence of child labour. The author argues for the need to take a gender perspective to address the whole question of a changing agrarian production structure under contract farming, especially issues associated with transfer of skills, choice of technology, organisation of labour, working conditions and terms of work.

http://www.iied.org/NR/agbioliv/gatekeepers/documents/GK111.pdf#search=%22Contract%20farming%20in%20India%20%3A%20impact%20on%20women%20and%20children%22

(Added: Mon Jul 25 2005   Modified: Fri Mar 28 2008   Hits: 193)

Fight Against Child Labour and Exploitation - The International Education And Resources Network (I*E

Should students be concerned about human rights? Should they be concerned by the exploitation of children in dangerous and oppressive labour? Should they be concerned that millions of children around our globe lack access to education and decent life chances and spend their youth in degrading, exhausting and dangerous work? The I*EARN "Fight Against Child Labour" project provides a place for youth to research issues of child labour, discuss issues, devise, develop and implement action agendas. The project began in late 1997 as a way of supporting the Global March Against Child Labor.

http://www.iearn.org.au/clp/index.htm

(Added: Fri Dec 14 2001   Modified: Mon Nov 14 2005   Hits: 105)

Free The Children

Free The Children is the largest network of children helping children through education in the world. Through our organization's unique youth-driven approach, more than one million young people have been involved in our innovative programs in more than 45 countries. Founded by international child rights activist Craig Kielburger, Free The Children has an established track-record of success, with three nominations for the Nobel Peace Prize and partnerships with the United Nations, and Oprah's Angel Network.

http://www.freethechildren.org

(Added: Wed Mar 08 2006   Hits: 73)

Global child labour trends 2000 to 2004 [pdf]

In 2004, an estimated global population of 191 million children aged 5-14 years were at work. This means that fewer children were working in 2004 than there were four years earlier, and the percentage of working children among the total child population has also declined. This report offers the first credible analysis of global and regional child labour trends. (International Labour Office, 2006)

http://www.ilo.org/dyn/declaris/DECLARATIONWEB.DOWNLOAD_BLOB?Var_DocumentID=6233

(Added: Tue May 23 2006   Modified: Thu Jun 01 2006   Hits: 53)

India's latest move to stop child labor

India is increasing its effort to rein in child labor, implementing a new law Tuesday that prevents children under the age of 14 from working as domestic help or in the hospitality sector. While child rights activists are praising the move as an important step, some are concerned the government is not providing alternatives to poor families dependent on that extra income. (Anuj Chopra, Christian Science Monitor, 19 October 2006)

http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/1010/p07s02-wosc.html

(Added: Wed Oct 11 2006   Hits: 48)

International Labour Organisation (ILO) Study On Child Labour

About 246 million children - one child in six - are working, most of them involved in dangerous jobs, the UN's International Labour Organisation (ILO) revealed in a study released at the beginning of May 2002. The greatest number of working children aged between five and 17 live in Asia and Africa, according to the study by the ILO. About 8.4 million children are caught in "unconditional" forms of labour, including slavery, trafficking, debt bondage and other forms of forced labour, forced recruitment for armed conflict, prostitution, pornography and other illicit activities. The ILO said natural disasters, economic downturns, wars and the HIV/AIDS pandemic drew the young into work, including prostitution, drug trafficking and pornography.

http://www.ilo.org/public/english/standards/ipec/simpoc/others/globalest.pdf

(Added: Thu May 30 2002   Modified: Mon Nov 14 2005   Hits: 178)

International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (IPEC) - The International Labour Organis

IPEC's aim is to work towards the progressive elimination of child labour by strengthening national capacities to address child labour problems, and by creating a worldwide movement to combat it. IPEC's priority target groups are bonded child labourers, children in hazardous working conditions and occupations and children who are particularly vulnerable, i.e. very young working children (below 12 years of age), and working girls.

http://www.ilo.org/public/english/standards/ipec/

(Added: Fri Dec 14 2001   Modified: Mon Nov 14 2005   Hits: 122)

Investing in Every Child: An Economic Study of the Czosts and Benefits of Eliminating Child Labour [PDF]

International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour: IPEC, 2003. One in every six children aged 5 to 17 worldwide is exploited by child labour in its different forms, according to estimates made by the ILO in 2002. Many of these children are forced to risk their health and their lives and mortgage their future as productive adults. This report is based on a wide range of data and technical assumptions about the quantifiable elements of the costs and benefits of ending child labour.

http://www.ilo.org/public/english/standards/ipec/publ/download/2003_12_investingchild.pdf

(Added: Mon Sep 26 2005   Hits: 279)

Nigeria: Domestic workers or modern day slaves?

Human traffickers make good business taking poorly educated girls from Nigerian villages to toil as domestic workers in the sprawling urban throb of Lagos. But the girls, some as young as five years old, see little or none of their earnings. Across West Africa, millions of girls - and less often boys - are effectively sold into slavery as domestic workers. Sexual, physical and emotional abuse is widespread. Many are kept under lock and key, and have no contact with anyone outside their employers - no one to turn to for help. (IRIN News, September 12, 2006)

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=55523&SelectRegion=West_Africa

(Added: Wed Sep 13 2006   Modified: Thu Jan 18 2007   Hits: 148)

Small Change: Bonded Child Labor in India's Silk Industry

Human Rights Watch report, January 2003. Millions of children in India toil as virtual slaves, unable to escape the work that will leave them impoverished, illiterate, and often crippled by the time they reach adulthood. These are India's bonded child laborers. A majority of them are Dalits, so-called untouchables. Bound to their employers in exchange for a loan, they are unable to leave while in debt and earn so little they may never be free of it. The Indian government knows about these children and has the mandate to free them. Instead, for reasons of apathy, caste bias, and corruption, many government officials deny that they exist at all.

http://www.hrw.org/reports/2003/india/

(Added: Sun Mar 02 2003   Modified: Mon Nov 14 2005   Hits: 128)

The brief describes three innovative initiatives to get girls out of work and into school in China, India and the Philippines. These initiatives incor

The 30 page report describes three innovative initiatives to get girls out of work and into school in China, India and the Philippines. These initiatives incorporate methods such as training girls to be peer educators; direct assistance to cover education costs; incorporating life skills and sex education; creating participatory "girl-friendly" environments and outreach education for communities; community mobilisation against bonded labour; training local girl-child activists to educate communities. The brief sets out key actions required to increase girls' participation in education. (UNESCO Bankok, 2006)

http://www.unescobkk.org/fileadmin/user_upload/appeal/gender/pdf/girls.pdf

(Added: Tue Aug 15 2006   Modified: Thu Jan 18 2007   Hits: 69)

The End of Child Labour: Within Reach (pdf)

The International Labour Organization's 100-page new report is cautiously optimistic. Child labour, especially in its worst forms, is in decline for the first time across the globe, and could feasibly be eliminated, in most of its worst forms, in 10 years. The report attributes the reduction in child labour to increased political will and awareness and concrete action, particularly in the field of poverty reduction and mass education that has led to a worldwide movement against child labour. Challenges that remain in the fight against child labour are reaching agricultural workers, addressing the impact of HIV/AIDS on child labour, and building stronger links between child labour and youth employment concerns. It is important to keep up the current pace of the decline through concerted action. (ILO, May 2006)

http://www.ilo.org/public/english/standards/relm/ilc/ilc95/pdf/rep-i-b.pdf

(Added: Tue May 16 2006   Hits: 86)

The Global March Against Child Labour

Global March Against Child Labour is a movement borne out of hope and the need felt by thousands of people across the globe - the desire to set children free from servitude. The dedicated partners of the Global March movement form an effective network around the world. Acting as vigilant observers and lobbying with governments in their region, they form the backbone of the movement. The Global March International Secretariat is located in New Delhi, India.

http://globalmarch.org

(Added: Fri Dec 14 2001   Modified: Mon Nov 14 2005   Hits: 106)

UNICEF: State of the World's Children Report 2005 [PDF - 6.5MB]

The UNICEF "State of the World's Children Report 2005 provides a comprehensive overview of the state of the World's Children. As Kofi Annan writes in the forward to the document "The State of the World's Children 2005 makes clear, for nearly half of the two billion children in the real world, childhood is starkly and brutally different from the ideal we all aspire to. Poverty denies children their dignity, endangers their lives and limits their potential. Conflict and violence rob them of a secure family life, betray their trust and their hope. HIV/AIDS kills their parents, their teachers, their doctors and nurses. It also kills them."

http://www.unicef.org/sowc05/english/sowc05.pdf

(Added: Mon Mar 27 2006   Hits: 232)

United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights - Child labour

United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights site on Child labour contains a section housing important documents as well as a newsroom with statements, press releases and messages. (In English, French and Spanish)

http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu2/i2chilab.htm

(Added: Fri Dec 14 2001   Modified: Mon Nov 14 2005   Hits: 104)

Where Sexual Exploitation of Minors Is Not a Crime

Sexual exploitation of minors is not classified as a crime in Guatemala, where activists say child sex tourism is on the rise. (Alberto Mendoza, IPS, 13 October 2006)

http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=35100

(Added: Tue Oct 17 2006   Hits: 193)