Pandemic-induced financial hardships and closure of schools has pushed many children into exploitative and dangerous labor to support their families, Human Rights Watch said in a report released on Wednesday
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 26th May, 2021) Pandemic-induced financial hardships and closure of schools has pushed many children into exploitative and dangerous labor to support their families, Human Rights Watch said in a report released on Wednesday.
"Many children feel they have no choice but to work to help their families survive, but a rise in child labour is not an inevitable consequence of the pandemic. Governments and donors should scale up cash allowances to families to keep children out of exploitative and dangerous child labour and protect children's rights to education and an adequate standard of living," HRW children's rights advocacy director Jo Becker was quoted as saying.
Researchers interviewed 81 children in Ghana, Nepal and Uganda, some as young as 8, and found that children had to work long hours for little pay after their parents lost their jobs or income as an effect of the pandemic and lockdowns.
The report, carried out in cooperation with the Initiative for Social and Economic Rights in Uganda and Friends of the Nation in Ghana, established that in each of the three African countries, over one-third of interviewed children worked at least 10 hours a day and some up to seven days a week. Some children in Nepal reported to work 14 hours a day at carpet sweatshops. Over a quarter of children interviewed said that their employers sometimes withheld their salaries or underpaid them.
"As millions of families struggle financially due to the pandemic, cash allowances are more important than ever to protect children's rights," Becker suggested.
According to the report, 1.3 billion children, mostly in Africa and Asia, are not covered by cash allowance programs. Recent findings suggest that Ghana, Nepal and Uganda have made "significant progress" in reducing poverty and child labor rates prior to the pandemic, which has slowed things down once again.
The report was released ahead of the World Day Against Child Labor on June 12.
