Stop hazardous child labour
By Rahima Aktar (Asst. Director, Eradication of Child Labour Project in Bangladesh, Ministry of Labour and Employment)

Child labour in Bangladesh is a major problem. It is a great hindrance to development, as a large number of children are engaged in various types of economical activities instead of attending school.
A child, between 5 and 17 years of age, who works for more than one hour per week, paid or unpaid, is called a child labourer. According to ILO, child labour is an activitiy conducted by a person below the age of 15, and when a child aged between 5 and 14 years works between 14 and 43 hours per week, paid or unpaid, it is called hazardous child labour.

According to the second "National labour survey" in 2003, of 42.39 million Bangladeshi children aged 5-17 years 7.42 million were economically active, of which 3.18 million were considered child labourers. It revealed that there were 1.3 million children involved in hazardous work. At present there are 45 hazardous sectors in Bangladesh where a large number of children are working at the risk of their lives.

Hazardous child labour is the most vulnerable form of child labour. It hinders the natural growth of a child, and leads to adverse effects on the child's safety, physical or mental health, and moral development. It violates child rights, and children suffer from severe muscular-skeletal and respiratory ailments due to hazardous work. There are many forms of hazardous child labour, e.g.

Those who are engaged in working with heavy or dangerous equipment, tools or loads, and who work in glass factories, bidi factories, automobile workshops, balloon factories, motor garages etc.

A large number of children aged 8-15 are engaged in domestic work. Most of the domestic workers work 16-17 hours a day, and 81% of them are female.

We can see a new form of hazardous child labour, i.e. selling popcorn, chocolate, cigarettes etc. near traffic signals on many roads.

About 40,000 children are engaged in producing dried fish, and working in salt factories in Cox's bazar.

The most hazardous and worst forms of child labour are child prostitution and pornography, and forced or bonded labour.
There are a good number of reasons for hazardous child labour, the major ones being poverty, deprivation created by natural calamities, lack of access to education, lack of primary and community schools, lack of awareness, and poor implementation of labour laws.

The following measures should be implemented to remove hazardous child labour :

Poverty alleviation programs for the people living below the poverty line, as poverty is the main cause of hazardous child labour.

Existing laws for the hazardous sector should be implemented.

The government should intensify its efforts to finalize an age limit for admission to hazardous sector, e.g. 14 years age.

Education is the best tool for reducing child labour, so education must be ensured for working children, but not in the traditional form. It must be provided in pleasant ways, with stipend, food, and vocational training.

Alternative income generating programs should be implemented for their parents.

Child labourers and their guardians and employers are not aware of child laws, child rights, CRC, and the bad effects of hazardous child labour. So awareness raising campaigns are needed.

Birth rate control and effective family planning programs are essential for reducing hazardous child labour.

Domestic child workers should get special attention, and people have to employ them under specific terms and condition.

Workplace safety must be ensured to reduce hazards.

Social mobilization and networking should be implemented.

NGOs and private organizations must cooperate in facing this problem.
Hazardous child labour is now a matter of great concern, as the 1.3 million child labourers of today will not be able to lead the country tomorrow. The Bangladesh government is also ready to combat child labour, and has ratified the ILO convention 182 which focuses on the worst forms of child labour.

Bangladesh is one of the 22 countries which were the first signatories of the UN CRC (child right convention). Besides, a memorandum of understanding (MOU) was signed between the Ministry of Labour and Employment and ILO in 1994 to implement IPEC activities. Bangladesh has implemented 91action programs. Under IPEC, Bangladesh has removed child labour from garment factories.

The Bangladesh government is implementing many plans to remove child labour under the Ministry of Labour and Employment, Social Welfare Ministry, Education Ministry, and primary and mass education. Besides, the government has undertaken the task of formulating a child labour policy for removing some anomalies in the legislation and fixing uniform minimum age for admission to work.

The Ministry of Labour and Employment has been implementing a project named Eradication of Hazardous Child Labour (2nd phase) Project in Bangladesh, which aims at removing 30,000 children from hazardous child labour, and making them skilled ones.

Elimination of hazardous child labour is a difficult but not insoluble problem. Political commitment, legal protection, social mobilization, and the combined efforts of GOs-NGOs can remove child labour. We hope that in the near future we will see our work places free from child labour.