- Let us Act Now on our Commitments: End Child Labour!
Image: Courtesy Photo
Global trends such as armed conflicts, increased domestic violence, disasters, and the COVID-19 pandemic have been blamed for the increase in child labor.
According to the International Labour Organization-ILo,these trends have reversed the gains made, in reducing child labour , plunging more families into poverty and forced millions more children into child labour, making it crucial to accelerate efforts toward ending child labour in all its forms.
International community commemorated the World Day against Child Labour under the theme “Let us Act Now on our Commitments: End Child Labour!”
Child labour is rooted in poverty, income insecurity, social injustice, lack of public services and limited or lack of social protection.
Statistics from the National Household Survey conducted by the UBOS in 2016/2017, showed that 2,048,000 children between the ages of 5 and 17, that is, 14%, were engaged in child labour activities. In Uganda .
There was an increase from 14% to 22% before 20th March 2020 and to 28.2% registered after the same date.
According to the survey report , the number of children in child labour had increased to 6.2 million (40%) . Of these 15.7 million children in Uganda aged 5-17 years were involved in child labour excluding household chores,.
It was discovered that more males were involved in child Labour at a 50.4% compares to females whose rate was recorded at 49.6%.
The latest global estimates indicate that 160 million children that is 63 million girls and 97 million boys were in child labour globally at the beginning of 2020, accounting for almost 1 in 10 of all children worldwide.
79 million children; nearly half of all those in child labour were in hazardous work that directly endangers their health, safety and physical and moral development.
According to ILO and UNICEF, Global Estimates of Child Labour trends and Road Forward, 2020 document, 92,200,000 that’s 21.6% Child labourers are on the African continent of which 86,600,000 (23.9) are in Sub Saharan Africa. 70.0% are in the agriculture sector include fishing, forestry and livestock herding, 19.7% in service and 10.3% in industry including mining.
World Day Against Child Labour was set up by The International Labour Organization (ILO) in 2002. The day highlights the plight of children engaged in child labour and serve as a catalyst for the growing worldwide movement against child labour.