Child Labour

Jamal Al –hendalGGS

How its an issue

• The International Labor Organization (ILO) has estimated that of the 250 million children between the ages of five and fourteen work in developing countries

• 61 percent are in Asia. Although we live in an extremely modern age, there is, in fact, child slave labor present in China and all around the world.

Sweat shops

• Some of these children work in sweatshops. • A sweatshop is a workplace where workers

are subjected to unsafe abuse, including the lack of a living wages or benefits, poor and dangerous working conditions, and harsh and unnecessary punishment.

Why it’s an issue• Children lose their childhood if they have to work.• A country that allows child labour will not have a highly

educated work force in the future.• Children suffer verbal and physical abuse. • Sweatshop workers are paid less than their daily

expenses.• They are never able to save any money to invest in

their futures.• They are trapped in a never-ending cycle• This child labour data was based on national surveys

conducted over the period 2005-2008

Cont.

• Defenders of sweatshops often bring up the fact that even though sweatshops are bad, they at least give people jobs they wouldn't have had.

• The type of jobs sweatshop workers receive are so bad that they rarely improve their economic situation.

Products made in sweatshops

• Toys• Bananas• Coffee• Clothing

Shoes

• Shoes: many athletic shoes are made in sweatshops in Asian countries.

Clothes

• Clothing: the average North American toy maker earns $11 an hour. In China, toy workers earn an average of 30 cents an hour.

• Rugs: Approximately 75% of Pakistan's carpet weavers are girls under 14

Chocolate

• Chocolate: 43% of cocoa beans come from the Ivory Coast where recent investigators have found child slavery.

How to help

• Sweat shops will not be easy to defeat since big organizations are running them with a lot of money and power. They have a big impact on 3rd world countries. The only way to reduce child labour and sweat shops is to educate people in 1st world countries about the goods they buy and search brands and how the products are made.

Cont.

• Check the labels on the clothes you buy. If they come from Pakistan, the Philippines or some South American country they may have been made by children.

• Write letters to companies that have factories in 3rd world countries. Tell them you want them to make sure their products are not made threw child labour.

Websites

• http://ihscslnews.org/view_article.php?id=57• http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/

IRchild.htm• http://www.senser.com/code.htm