World Day Against Child Labor

June 12th is World Day Against Child Labor 2010

Every day, hundreds of millions of children around the world are forced to engage in work that deprives them of their rights to education, health, leisure and basic freedoms.

More than half of these boys and girls are exposed to the worst forms of child labor, such as work in hazardous environments, drug trafficking, prostitution, and involvement in armed conflict.

International World Day Against Child Labor serves as a way to highlight the plight of these children, and act as a catalyst for the growing worldwide movement against child labor. The theme of this year’s World Day Against Child Labor is “Go for the Goal… End Child Labor”, with the goal set to eliminate the worst forms of child labor by 2016.

What is Plan doing to end child labor?

Plan works closely with families and communities around the world to ensure awareness of child labor issues and other children’s rights, including equal access to education and recreation for girls and boys. We aim to prevent all types of exploitation of children, and support programs that help families earn sufficient income and keep their children out of paid work.

In Malawi, for example, where tens of thousands of children are working as tobacco pickers, Plan is working to help enforce Malawian laws on child labor, promote birth registration, and provide options for alternative income for Malawian families.

It is estimated that over 78,000 children work on tobacco estates across Malawi – some for up to 12 hours a day, for less than $0.17 an hour and without protective clothing. A recent report revealed that these children, some as young as five, absorb up to 54 milligrams a day of dissolved nicotine through their skin - the equivalent of 50 average cigarettes.

Children working as tobacco pickers revealed the physical, sexual and emotional abuse they suffer and spoke about the need to work under these exploitative conditions to support themselves, their families and pay school fees. They reported symptoms of nicotine poisoning, including severe headaches, abdominal pain, muscle weakness, coughing and breathlessness.

In response, Plan is calling upon all responsible parties to live up to their commitments: the Malawian government to rigorously enforce existing child labor and protection laws; plantations to provide safer, fairer working conditions for those children forced to work and multinational tobacco companies to scrutinize their suppliers far more closely and strictly adhere to their own corporate responsibility guidelines.

Plan is also helping Malawian families with projects to grow alternative crops that provide a higher and more reliable income than tobacco, and do not rely on child labor. And by promoting birth registration, Plan is helping enforce Malawian laws on child labor, which prohibit children under 14 from working.

Learn more about Plan's child protection programs