Child Labour in Bangladesh

 Introduction

Child labour, particularly in its worst forms, harms the health and general welfare of children. It is considered to be a decisive impediment to the development efforts of developing countries. Child labour is now a global concern and as such attracted attention of people in various sectors. In fact, it is the product of an unequal society. Bangladesh is one of the countries that still face the challenge of having a large number of children that are working under conditions considered as child labour. The prime reason is poverty.  Bangladesh is the home to more than five percent of world’s working child population. Further, the majority of child domestics tend to be 12 to 17 years old. But children as young as 5 or 6 years old can also be found working and a survey of child domestic workers found that 38 percent were 11 to 13 years old and nearly 24 percent were 5 to 10 years old. Child domestics’ workers work long hours 12 to 14 hours a day. Out of the total estimated child population aged 5-17 years about 22.7 million were boys and 19.7 million girls. An enormous number of child workers who are working in the existing labour market and this clearly force the society to pay attention to the child labour problem. Honestly speaking, when it is time to go to school with books in the hand, the ill-fated children of the country are being forced to work inhumanly only for the survival and income generation of the family. In the working places they are exploited more than the adult workers. It is for these reasons that child labour has been given some importance in Bangladesh and a great deal in the world. In recent years Bangladesh has taken various measures, including legal measures, to address the situation. 

Definition of ‘child’ and ‘child labour’ 

It is estimated that more than 250 million children are involved in income generating activities worldwide. Defining child labor is problematic. The definition given by the United Nations in 1982 is “Work may mean many kinds of productive activities. Some children are in paid employment, and nothing, but age distinguishes them from adult workers. Others are in training for which they receive payment. Others do piece work at home for outside employers. While others perform unpaid work within the family, or render services for which they are tipped varying amounts. Child labor is in fact a “portmanteau” term covering the most diverse situations.”

Without explicitly defining “child labour”, the UN CRC broadly defines the work-related circumstances that a child shall be protected from. Children shall enjoy protection “... from economic exploitation and from performing any work that is likely to be hazardous or to interfere with the child's education, or to be harmful to the child's health or physical, mental, spiritual, moral or social development.”

According to UNICEF, “Child labour is work that is likely to interfere with a child’s education and development; labour that exceeds a minimum number of hours, labour that is hazardous; and labour performed by a child who is underage according to state legislation. A child is considered a person under the age of 18 years.”

ILO signifies some activities as the worst form of labour. It defines, “The worst forms of child labour include trafficking, armed conflict, slavery, debt bondage, sexual exploitation and hazardous work.”

The Children (Pledging of Labour) Act 1933 and the Employment of Children Act 1938 determine that the minimum age for children is 15 and 12, respectively. To further complicate things, the Factories Act 1965 states that individuals under 14 years of age are children whereas the Children Act 1974 states that a child is an individual under 16 years of age. In addition, under contract law, a minor cannot enter into agreement until attaining the age of 18. Muslim personal laws on marriage, however, determine that a child becomes an adult on attaining the age of puberty.

In response to these varying laws and the lack of a uniform age regime, the highly-anticipated 2006 Bangladesh Labour Act both consolidates and abrogates all of the existing labour laws and determines that a child is an individual under the age of 14. The adolescent can work in a factory if a certificate of fitness is granted to him or her, if he or she carries a token while at work which gives reference to the certificate. An exception is provided for, as per section 44, a child who is 12 years of age may be employed if the work does not endanger his or her health or interfere with his or her education. 

 Legal framework related to child labor:

Bangladesh passed the labour act in 2006known as Labour Code 2006. This act includes a chapter on child labour. This act outlaws the employment of any childless than 14 years of age and it also prohibits hazardous forms of child labour for anyone under the age of 18years.However, according to the act, children who are aged 12 years and above may get involve in “light work” that does not bare the risk of any potential damage to their mental and physical development and does not hamper their education. The law does not provide a strong enforcement mechanism for the child labour provisions. Additionally, the vast majority of children (93 per cent) work in the informal sector this is making the enforcement of the relevant legislation challenging.

Law enforcement agencies in Bangladesh took actions to combat child labor, including its worst forms, during the reporting period.

Labor Law Enforcement

In 2013, the Directorate of the Chief Inspector of Factories and Establishments (DFIE), within the Ministry of Labor and Employment (MOLE), employed 183 labor inspectors nationwide. This marked an increase of 39 from the previous year. In addition, in January 2014, the Government issued orders to hire an additional 392 labor inspectors; which once implemented would bring the total number of labor inspectors to 575. As of July 2014, these new labor inspectors have yet to be hired because of bureaucratic challenges. DFIE conducts unannounced inspections in both factories and small businesses to investigate various labor issues, including child labor. In 2013, DFIE conducted approximately 500 inspections per month. Working from one of 31 offices located across the country, each inspector conducts between 4 and 20 inspections monthly, depending on the inspector’s capacity and number of facilities. Five inspection teams are assigned to monitoring labor violations in the shrimp sector, and specialized monitoring teams regularly inspect export factories in the ready-made garment sector. In 2013, the ILO and the German Government provided training to new labor inspectors, including on the Labor Code (as well as child labor) and inspection techniques.

No enforcement data were publicly available during the reporting period, including the number of child labor investigations, prosecutions, and convictions. While reports indicate that child labor inspections occurred in export garment factories and shrimp processing, child labor inspections were infrequent, with no oversight of the children working in the informal sector, including unregistered subcontractors in the garment sector. On March 30, 2014, MOLE, with support from the ILO, launched a publicly accessible database for labor inspections in all export factories in the ready-made garment sector. The inspection information is under review for quality control and has yet to be included in the database.

Criminal Law Enforcement

In 2013, the Government reported 377 trafficking cases resulting in 172 prosecutions and 14 convictions. No information is available as to whether these investigations, prosecutions, and convictions involved child victims of human trafficking. The Ministry of Social Welfare (MOSW) provides services to trafficking victims. However, there is no systematic referral system for the police to inform the MOSW about trafficking victims. To date, the Government of Bangladesh and the Government of India have not formally signed an MOU to bring the Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) of the Rescue, Recovery, Repatriation, and Reintegration Task Force into official use, although NGOs report that the two governments are using this system. NGOs also note that there are no formal referral mechanisms for children trafficked from other countries. They allege that government officials refer victims back to the NGOs that initially identified and rescued them.

Coordination of government efforts on the worst forms of child labor

The Government has established mechanisms to coordinate its efforts to address child labor, including its worst forms.  

MOLE’s Child Labor Unit is no longer functioning. However, MOLE is working to create a permanent body on child labor within its ministry. MOLE’s proposal for this permanent body is currently pending with the Ministry of Public Administration.

Government policies on the worst forms of child labor

The Government of Bangladesh has established policies related to child labor, including its worst forms. 

During the reporting period, senior government officials, international organizations, and officials of Bangladeshi NGOs met to discuss the Domestic Workers Protection and Welfare Policy, which was drafted in 2010. If implemented, the Policy would help protect the rights of child domestic workers and include domestic service on the List of Hazardous Occupations and Working Conditions Prohibited for Children; it continues to await official approval.

Present situation Child Labour in Bangladesh

Child Labour in Bangladesh Bangladesh is facing the challenge to accomplish targets set by several national and international commitments because of huge prevalence of child labour. It is one of the major obstacles for Bangladesh in achieving MDG goal, reducing poverty, achieving universal primary education, and realizing its prospective plan for 2010-2021. According to the latest National Child Labour Survey (NCLS) carried out by the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) in 2003, among 42.39 million children aged 5-17 years 7.42 million are economically active, of which 3.18 million or 43 percent are considered child labourers. The highest number of economically active children is 4.41 million at the age group of 10-14 years. According to the survey, about 1.3 million children work 43 or more hours per week, which is considered to be in hazardous conditions. The incidence of hazardous child labour increases with the age, highest (57%) in 15-17 age group followed by 10-14 age group (40%). More than 90 percent of children who work long hours are boys. More children work long hours in rural areas (70%) compared to those in urban area (30%). The survey also revealed that the worst forms of child labour were present largely in manufacturing (27.65%), followed by agriculture (20.91%) and trading (19.36%) sector. The Situation of Child Labour in Bangladesh Prevalence of Child Labour is a common scenario in most of the least developed and developing countries, and Bangladesh is no exception. At the age of schooling and joyful childhood days, many children are compelled to work for their family and livelihood. 3 When a poor family becomes victim to the scourge of persistent poverty, it is impossible for the head of the household to keep his/her children safe, cuddled and bonded with family by optimum care. In this situation once displaced from the family, children face the reality of the society. Some of them start selling their labour as workers, some turn into street children because of the fact of not being able to manage a job. Despite possessing all the innocent attributes, a significant number of them become rootless and ruthless because they have been disintegrated from their families and become a social outcast to many people. Another form of child labour in Bangladesh is the victims of child trafficking,

 where especially girls are compelled to engage in prostitution and pornography while boys get involved in many illegal and illicit activities. Economically Active Children - 7.5% of the total child population aged 5-17 years (7.4 millionold. Over 81% of the economically active children are from the rural areas. Approximately 73% of the children aged5-17 years engaged in economic activities are male (BBS, 2003). Child Labour - 7.5% (or 3.2 million) of the total child population aged 5-17 years are engaged in child labour. Approximately 58% of child labourers are aged 5-14. It is also estimated that 2.4 million or approximately 77% of child labourers are from rural areas. The proportion of male to female child labourer is 3:1 (BBS, 2003) Hazardous Child Labour - 1.29 million children (or 3%) of the total child population are involved in hazardous child labour. Approximately 42.9% of those involved in hazardous child labour are 5-14 year olds. Over 90.7% of the children involved in hazardous work are male (BBS, 2003).

Sector-wise Working Children and Child Labour

Child labour is commonly found in two sectors in Bangladesh:

1.     Formal Sector: namely factories and industries, commercial organizations, communication and transportation, ship breaking, etc. 

2.    Informal Sector: namely agriculture, livestock, fishery, household work, construction work, brick breaking, pulling of rickshaw/van, day labouring, street child etc.

The Causes of Child Labour

Causes of child labour can be observed through different lens. Such as optional or opportunity aspect where children work as supporting hand in the family based activities and another is the cases where many families compel to rely on the income generated by their children for survival.

Different studies and researches show that the major and leading cause of child labour in Bangladesh is the economic hardship of the family. Poor parents cannot afford to bear the educational expenses. Therefore, parents or guardians feel reluctant to send their children to school. Under such a situation, parent considers their children better to assist their profession or engage in any other job to supplement the family income. In case of death of household head, the family finds it very difficult to meet the basic needs, let alone children’s education.

Again in case parents get separated, their children face extreme hardships in managing foods. Poverty stricken families with large in size with lot of sufferings sends their children to work in maintaining the family necessities. High rate unemployment, social insecurity, resource scarcity are the underlying factors of migration from rural to urban areas. Natural calamities like riverbankerosion, floods, droughts, storms and tidalsurges, earthquakes, etc. drive children towards greater risks of being engaged in physical labour. Study shows that for the case of first generation learner, poverty and lack of awareness, many parents fail to estimate the opportunity cost of education. In such a situation they cannot keep the patience to continue their children’s education for a continuous period of 10 or 15 years. From the demand side, the employers and concerned authorities prefer to engage children at work as they can easily be exploited to work longer hourswith minimum wages. Employers often prefer to employ children because they are cheaper and considered to be more compliant and obedient than adults. Child labour is also increasing due to non-availability of education materials,lack of opportunity for education and indifferent attitude of parents regarding the negative impact of child labour. Due to the culture of excessive dependence on the domestic help and usual way of living in urban life, young people preferably girl child of rural areas are picked up and brought to the town for domestic work.

 Way of eliminating or decreasing child labour

Ways of reducing child labour is a challenging task, which necessitate financial, moral and political sustenance from all the tiers of the society. Because the problem of child labour is indissolubly embedded in our society, so attempts should be made to decrease it from the primary stage. Poverty, as mentioned earlier, is the primary reason behind child labour and it drives children to involve in employment to fight against starvation and to supplement their family income. This is why; the effective solutions of child labour must be based on the reduction of chronic poverty through economic and social development, with emphasis on human resource development. To eradicate the problem, child centred educative sensitivity and awareness is essential at political, community and family level. To create educative sensitivity among parents, family members and in the community the existing schooling process should be restructured. Unfortunately, budget provided for education are not adequate enough and used properly for its designed purpose because of the corruption and inefficiency of the system. Enclosure of knowledge about child labour in school curriculum will help building awareness nationally. Employment creation and income generation for adults will help to eradicate poverty and child labour problem in the country. Legislation concerning child labour is adequate enough but improper implementation of laws is main obstacle.

Conclusion

The state, society, parents and international agencies need to play complementary roles in eliminating child labour. The interests of different players in this area are of course often diametrically opposed. This implies that all parties will have to be prepared to give and take - a process that needs to be economically viable and ultimately in the interests of the children who do not have the maturity to decide for themselves. In Bangladesh, child labour cannot be considered in isolation from the socio-economic realities. This means that total and sudden elimination of child labour at one point of time could threaten the delicate socio-economic balances of the less developed countries. But the price of child labour is continued illiteracy, backwardness, ill-health and adult unemployment. Hence, sector-wise elimination in a phased manner is appropriate. Technical cooperation to governments, non-governmental organisations and other agencies in this endeavor must be strongly promoted.