Child labor and street children

Child labour and
street children
Swornim Bajracharya
Masters in Public Health
BPKIHS, Dharan
Swornim Bajracharya (MPH )

Introduction
 In today’s world the situation of child labourers and
street children has preoccupied the minds of many
human rights activists and social issues experts.
 Many children work and live on the streets in
unsuitable conditions in busy streets, in the cold and
heat and pollution, they are human beings and
helping them is crucial and necessary as a human
rights challenge.
 This phenomenon is not exclusive to a particular
country, but we see this problem practically across
the whole world.

Introduction
 Children who undertake arduous work that they are
incapable of doing or dangerous jobs, due to
economic and financial needs, with the aim of
producing goods or services to receive wages, are
considered as child labourers.
 Overall, children who have to work on the streets for
their survival in big cities, are called street children.
The term is usually associated with children who both
work and sleep on the streets.

Child labour-ILO
 The term “child labour” is often defined as work that deprives
children of their childhood, their potential and their dignity,
and that is harmful to physical and mental development.
 It refers to work that:
 is mentally, physically, socially or morally dangerous and
harmful to children; and
 interferes with their schooling by:
 depriving them of the opportunity to attend school;
 obliging them to leave school prematurely; or
 requiring them to attempt to combine school attendance
with excessively long and heavy work.

Child labour
 Not all work done by children should be classified as child labour
that is to be targeted for elimination.
 Children’s or adolescents’ participation in work that does not
affect their health and personal development or interfere with
their schooling, is generally regarded as being something
positive.
 This includes activities such as helping their parents around the
home, assisting in a family business or earning pocket money
outside school hours and during school holidays.
 These kinds of activities contribute to children’s development and
to the welfare of their families; they provide them with skills and
experience, and help to prepare them to be productive members
of society during their adult life.

 In its most extreme forms, child labour involves children being
enslaved, separated from their families, exposed to serious
hazards and illnesses and/or left to fend for themselves on the
streets of large cities – often at a very early age.
 Whether or not particular forms of “work” can be called “child
labour” depends on the child’s age, the type and hours of work
performed, the conditions under which it is performed and the
objectives pursued by individual countries.
 The answer varies from country to country, as well as among
sectors within countries.

Minimum Age for Work
 The main principles of the ILO’s Convention concerning the
minimum age of admission to employment and work are listed
below.
 Hazardous work
Any work which is likely to jeopardize children’s physical, mental or
moral heath, safety or morals should not be done by anyone under
the age of 18.
 Basic Minimum Age
The minimum age for work should not be below the age for
finishing compulsory schooling, which is generally 15.
 Light work
Children between the ages of 13 and 15 years old may do light
work, as long as it does not threaten their health and safety, or
hinder their education or vocational orientation and training.

Global scenario
 Global number of children in child labour has declined by
one third since 2000, from 246 million to 168 million
children. More than half of them, 85 million, are in
hazardous work (down from 171 million in 2000).
 Asia and the Pacific still has the largest numbers (almost 78
million or 9.3% of child population), but Sub-Saharan
Africa continues to be the region with the highest incidence
of child labour (59 million, over 21%).
 There are 13 million (8.8%) of children in child labour
in Latin America and the Caribbean and in the Middle East
and North Africa there are 9.2 million (8.4%).
 Child labour among girls fell by 40% since 2000, compared
to 25% for boys.Swornim Bajracharya (MPH )

 The most recent ILO Global Report on child labour
Accelerating action against child labour was produced
in 2010.
 Its estimates were based on data from a range of
sources, including national child labour surveys
supported by the ILO, the World Bank’s Living
Standards Measurement Study (LSMS) surveys and the
Multiple Indicator Cluster Surveys (MICS) conducted
by UNICEF.
 The report suggested that:

 There were about 306 million economically active
children aged 5‐17 in 2008 (including older children
working legitimately)
 of whom 215 million could be regarded as child
labourers;
 among those child labourers, 115 million were
involved in hazardous work – used as a proxy for the
worst forms of child labour.

 Corresponding figures for the narrower age group of
5‐14 year olds, i.e. the target group for basic
education at primary and lower secondary level are:
 176 million economically active children; • 153 million
child labourers;
 53 million children in hazardous work. In absolute
numbers Asia and the Pacific account for more than
96 million of the number of economically active
children in the 5‐14 age range, an activity rate of
14.8%.

 Sub‐Saharan Africa accounts for 58 million of the
economically active children aged 5‐14, an activity
rate of 28.4%. In comparison to the previous estimates
of 2004, this number has increased by 9 million.
 Most child labour can be found in agriculture (60%),
while 25.6 % of all children work in services and 7.0%
work in industry; another 7.5% work in not defined
sectors

In Nepal
 The incidence of child labour in Nepal is relatively
high compared with other countries in South Asia.
 According to data from the Multiple Indicator Cluster
Surveys (MICS) and other national surveys, Nepal
has 34% of its children between the age of 5 and 14
who are involved in child labour, compared with 12%
in the South Asia region as a whole.
 Out of 9.2 million children, 2.6 million children of age
5-14 years work as child workers

 There are more female than male child labourers, and
the situation is worse in rural than urban areas.
 In 2010, 44% of children age 5 to 14 were involved in
child labour activities in the mid- and far-western
regions of Nepal.
 According to the Nepal Labour Force Survey (NLFS) in
2008, 86.2% of children who were working were also
studying and 13.8% of the children work only.

 621,000 children are estimated to be engaged in
hazardous work
 In Kathmandu valley, estimated 11-13000 girls and
women are working in “night entertainment industry”,
of which a many are forced to engage in sexual
activities and are vulnerable to trafficking. Nearly half
of all entered the area before age of 18.

Forms of child Labour

Forms of child labour in Nepal
 Agriculture
 Industrial
 Mines and kilns
 Informal sector
 Construction work
 Plantation
 Domestic service
 Other Worst Forms of Child Labour Bonded Labour,
Child Sex Trade, Trafficked children

Causes of child labour

Causes of child labour
 PRIMARY CAUSES:
 International Labour Organization (ILO) suggests
poverty is the greatest single cause behind child
labour.
 For impoverished households, income from a child's
work is usually crucial for his or her own survival or
for that of the household.
 Income from working children, even if small, may be
between 25 to 40% of these household income.

Causes of labour
 Low Aspiration: It is important for parents and
children to understand that they can work hard and
make something great of themselves. Low
aspirations by parents and children is a major cause
of child labour because in such a situation, being
employed in a local factory, or selling grocery in the
streets is the normal way of life.
 Huge demand of unskilled labour
 Illiteracy
 Early marriage
 High cost of education

International laws and
conventions
 The convention on rights of children 1989
 ILO minimum age for employment convention 138
 ILO worst forms of child labour convention no.182

Worst form of child labour
 Child labour takes many different forms, a priority is to
eliminate without delay the worst forms of child labour as
defined by:
Article 3 of ILO Convention No. 182:
 (a) all forms of slavery or practices similar to slavery, such
as the sale and trafficking of children, debt bondage and
serfdom and forced or compulsory labour, including
forced or compulsory recruitment of children for use in
armed conflict;
 (b) the use, procuring or offering of a child for
prostitution, for the production of pornography or for
pornographic performances;

 (c) the use, procuring or offering of a child for illicit
activities, in particular for the production and
trafficking of drugs as defined in the relevant
international treaties;
 (d) work which, by its nature or the circumstances in
which it is carried out, is likely to harm the health,
safety or morals of children."

Hazardous work
 An ILO Recommendation (No. 190, paragraph 3), which
accompanies Convention No. 182, provides a list of
elements that should be considered when determining
what constitutes hazardous work:
 work which exposes children to physical, psychological or
sexual abuse;
 work underground, under water, at dangerous heights or
in confined spaces;
 work with dangerous machinery, equipment and tools, or
which involves the manual handling or transport of heavy
loads;

 work in an unhealthy environment which may, for
example, expose children to hazardous substances,
agents or processes, or to temperatures, noise levels,
or vibrations damaging to their health;
 work under particularly difficult conditions such as
work for long hours or during the night or work where
the child is unreasonably confined to the premises of
the employer.

National legislation and legal
framework
 Children’s ACT 1992: Child is defined as age of 16 years. It
protects the rights and interest of children and their
physical, mental and intellectual development and
prohibits a child below 14 years to engage in any kind of
labour work
 Child labour Act 2002: regulated hrs of wok for 14-16 and
prohibits employment of children younger than 16 years
of age into hazardous work. It also states that no child can
be engaged in work against his/her will or else will be
liable to punishment of one yr in maximum or fine of fifty
thousand rupees

 Kamaiya labour act 2002: The act prohibits child
labour, makes provision for freeing bonded labourers
and cancelling debt flowing from such arrangements.

Structures at regional, district and
community level
 10 labour offices
 Women and children offices in 75 districts
 District child welfare boards in 75 districts
 Juvenile benches in 30 districts
 Formation of child protection committees in 1051
VDCS
 Promotion of child helpline no.1098 and toll free no.
104

 The Government of Nepal has expressed its firm
commitment to combat both general and worst forms
of child labor, which is now being reflected in national
policies and programmes.
 Government of Nepal is currently implementing a
National Master Plan on Child Labor, which aims at
eliminating all forms of child labor by 2014

Consequences
 Loss of Quality childhood
 Health issues
 Mental trauma
 Illiteracy

Challenges

Challenges
 Lack of Awareness on Child Labour
 Lack of Laws and Regulations and their
implementation
 Lack of Political Commitment and Will
 Lack of Integrated and Coordinated Actions
 Lack of Sustainable Programmes and Resources
 Lack of Follow-up, Monitoring and Evaluation

Street children

Street Children
 Street children is a term for children
experiencing poverty (homelessness) who are living on
the streets of a city and selling their body to survive.
 Street kids and street youth; the definition of street
children is contested, but many practitioners and
policymakers use UNICEF’s concept of boys and girls,
aged under 18 years, for whom "the street" (including
unoccupied dwellings and wasteland) has become home
and/or their source of livelihood, and who are
inadequately protected or supervised

 Street children are minors who live and survive on the
streets. They often grow up in public landfills, train
stations, our under the bridges of the world’s major
cities.
 Because of conflicts with their family, these children
don’t want to or can’t return home.

 There are two groups of street children.
 The first group is ‘Children of the street’, which refers
to children who are homeless, and streets in urban
areas are their source of livelihood, where they sleep
and live.
 The second group is ‘Children on the street’, who
work and live on the streets in the daytime but return
back home at night where they sleep, although some
of them sleep occasionally on the streets (UNCHS,
2000). Swornim Bajracharya (MPH )

 Nevertheless, there is no clear distinction between the
two groups as they often differ from their common
definition:
 some ‘children of the street’ may still have links with
their families and some ‘children on the street’ often
sleep on the street (UNICEF, 2001).

Scenario
 There are estimated to be around 120 million children
living on the streets in the world (30 million in Africa, 30
million in Asia, and 60 million in South America)
 According to UN sources there are up to 150 million street
children in the world today.
 Chased from home by violence, drug and alcohol abuse,
the death of a parent, family breakdown, war, natural
disaster or simply socio-economic collapse, many
destitute children are forced to eke out a living on the
streets, scavenging, begging, hawking in the slums and
polluted cities of the developing worldSwornim Bajracharya (MPH )

 Various categories of street children exist. There are those
who work on the streets as their only means of getting
money, those who take refuge on the streets during the
day but return to some form of family at night and those
who permanently live on the street without a family
network.
 All are at risk from abuse, exploitation and vigilante or
police violence, but the most vulnerable are those who
actually sleep and live on the streets, hiding under bridges,
in gutters, in railway stations.

In Nepal
 Children aged below 16 years constitute 41% of Nepal’s
population.
 While on the street they face problems of hunger, shelter,
clothes, etc. Similarly, face problems from police, “dada”
(bullies), gang etc. With all these problems and tensions,
they lead their complex life
 15% of the children in a street situation are from the
eastern Terai district of Sunsari.
 There are around 5000 street children all over Nepal. In
Kathmandu only, it is estimated that the number of street
children is approximately 1200-1500

 Children as young as 9 are smoking ganja: 35% of 13 year
old and 60% of street youth regularly smoke ganja.
 Street children from the age of 6 are regularly sniffing glue.
 The critical ages for many street children to use glue seem
to be between 9 and 13. It is here that 25-35% of the
children have not tried sniffing glue.
 Less than 25% of street children 13 years old or less stated
they have had sexual relationship with penetration
compared to over 50% of those 14 and older

Causes

Causes
 There are two main causes of the phenomenon of
street children.
 The first is the economic stress and poor conditions
that families face due to industrialization and
urbanization.
 The second cause is changes in the traditional family
structure, especially when women became the main
contributor to households’ economies (Patel, 1990;
Le Roux and Smith, 1998; Lugalla and Mbwambo,
1999).

 Nevertheless, poverty cannot stand alone as the only
reason behind the phenomenon of street children, as
a comparative research conducted on street children
and working children in Brazil shows that the per
capital household income of families of street children
is higher than that of working children’s families
(Rizzini et al., 1994).

Reasons they are on street
 To earn money for themselves and support their
families.
 To find shelter.
 To escape from family problems including rejection.
 To escape from work demands in the home.
 To escape from a children’s institution.

Statistics about the sexual abuse
of street children:
 75% of street children in Kathmandu are victims of
sexual abuse at the hands of foreigners, locals and
their peers. Here are some worrying and disturbing
figures. Main reasons for migrating to street:
 41.1% Family violence
 27.1% Peer influence
 19.6% Family economic situation 15.9 Family
disintegration
 0.9% To escape from conflict situation
 3.7% To seek opportunities

Reason of children for becoming homeless on the streets of
Kathmandu
41% of children leave home due to family violence
 27% due to peer influence
 19% due to economic factors
 15% due to disintegration of the family
The perpetrators of sexual abuse to children
 10.7% foreigner
 83% Nepali male
 3.6% Nepali female
 2.7% Third genderSwornim Bajracharya (MPH )

Problems

Problems
Social problems
 Poverty and illiteracy.
 Discrimination and lack of accessible resources.
 Violent Environment.
 Stigmatization.
Physical problems.
 Lack of adequate nutrition.
 Injuries.
 Sexual and reproductive health problems.
 Common diseases.Swornim Bajracharya (MPH )

Psychological/mental problems.
 A Stressful Past.
 A Transitory Lifestyle.
 Mental health
 Substance abuse

Public approaches to street
children
 There are four categories of how societies deal with
street children:
 Correctional model,
 Rehabilitative model,
 Outreach strategies, and
 Preventive approach.

 The Correctional model is primarily used by governments
and the police.
 They view children as a public nuisance and risk to security
of the general public.
 The objective of this model would be to protect the public
and help keep the kids away from a life of crime.
 The methods this model uses to keep the children away
from the life of crime are the juvenile justice system and
specific institutions

 The Rehabilitative model is supported by churches and
NGOs.
 The view of this model is that street children are damaged
and in need of help.
 The objective of this model is to rehabilitate children into
mainstream society.
 The methods used to keep children from going back to the
streets are education, drug detoxification programs, and
providing children with a safe family-like environment.

 The Outreach strategy is supported by street
teachers, NGOs, and church organizations.
 This strategy views street children as oppressed
individuals in need of support from their communities.
 The objective of the Outreach strategy is to empower
the street children by providing outreach education
and training to support children.

 The Preventive approach is supported by NGOs, the
coalition of street children, and lobbying
governments.
 They view street children’s poor circumstances from
negative social and economic forces.
 In order to help street children, this approach focuses
on the problems that cause children to leave their
homes for the street by targeting parents’
unemployment, poor housing campaign for children’s
rights.

Solutions
 Laws
 Free education
 Ethical consumerism and Moral polishing
 Create demand for trained and skilled workers
 Awareness
 Empowerment of poor people
 Protection of Children, especially from trafficking and
other forms of violence
 Protection of children from the conflict situation

Some of organizations for
children
 ILO (co-Kathmandu)
 CWIN (Child workers in Nepal)
 CWISH
 Maiti Nepal
 ETC (educate the child)
 Child Watabaran Centre Nepal
 Khushi Nepal
 Voice of children
 Balmandir

Conclusion
 Child labour and street children are not just an
affront to the rights of a child but also a symbol of a
society that has lost its way.
 The problem of children in Nepal is complex; so the
policymakers most employ multiple interventions
that are integrated with one another.
 They should implement sustainable alternatives to
keep children from returning to the hazardous and
exploitive situations on the cold streets

 We should, therefore, all strive to ensure that the
fundamental rights of children are protected and that
they are accorded the opportunity to go after their
dreams and aspirations.
 The future is much brighter when the younger
generation has a good foundation for success.
 The innocence of a child should never be taken away
for the purpose of making the lives of adults easier. It
is both unfair and morally unacceptable

Thank you

Child labor and street children

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