work not ping pong today...
There's a banner hanging over the highway: Cambodia To End The Worst Forms of Child Labour by 2016.
My first thought? Pathetic! If this is an important issue that needs an urgent response, what's with this vague reply with a deadline half a decade away?
I did some research and found out that ILO (International Labour Organisation) stats from 2001 showed that 52% of 7-14 year olds in Cambodia, over 1.4 million, were 'economically active'. Perhaps it isn't easy to change the lives of 1.4 million children overnight. So we think about the children working in the 'worst' forms of labour....seven year old boys in Battambang working in brick factories, nine year old girls puling carts across the Thai border with their brothers and sisters, ten year old kids begging on the streets of Bangkok. These are dirty, dangerous and difficult jobs. Sometimes (often?) these children are forced to work without payment.
More recent ILO surveys conducted in Poipet in 2010-2011 found there are approximately 2 246 children in Poipet who are working. About 500 are employed pushing carts across the border. The rest collect rubbish, sew, work in agriculture and beg.
As I sit writing this blog, our staff return to the office from Ping Pong looking a little disappointed. They say that the kids didn't come today.
Nobody at all?
Well, only two. The rest were working. We saw some of them pushing carts down main street while we were waiting at the front of the building. They said they wanted to play but they had to work today to help their families.
Kids need to learn to play. Ending the worst forms of child labour by 2016 seems almost like a token response. But it's a start.
My first thought? Pathetic! If this is an important issue that needs an urgent response, what's with this vague reply with a deadline half a decade away?
I did some research and found out that ILO (International Labour Organisation) stats from 2001 showed that 52% of 7-14 year olds in Cambodia, over 1.4 million, were 'economically active'. Perhaps it isn't easy to change the lives of 1.4 million children overnight. So we think about the children working in the 'worst' forms of labour....seven year old boys in Battambang working in brick factories, nine year old girls puling carts across the Thai border with their brothers and sisters, ten year old kids begging on the streets of Bangkok. These are dirty, dangerous and difficult jobs. Sometimes (often?) these children are forced to work without payment.
More recent ILO surveys conducted in Poipet in 2010-2011 found there are approximately 2 246 children in Poipet who are working. About 500 are employed pushing carts across the border. The rest collect rubbish, sew, work in agriculture and beg.
As I sit writing this blog, our staff return to the office from Ping Pong looking a little disappointed. They say that the kids didn't come today.
Nobody at all?
Well, only two. The rest were working. We saw some of them pushing carts down main street while we were waiting at the front of the building. They said they wanted to play but they had to work today to help their families.
Kids need to learn to play. Ending the worst forms of child labour by 2016 seems almost like a token response. But it's a start.
posted by pip @ 3:04 pm
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