65105855.

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East West University

Semester: Spring 2009

Assignment On

Child Labor Should Not Be Banned

Submitted to:

Farhana Zareen Bashar Lecturer Department of English East West University.

Submitted by: Shamsul Arefin ID: 2007-3-10-051 Department of Business Administration East West University.

Date of submission: 21th April, 2009.

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Child Labor Should Not Be Banned

Child labour should be banned, a most pronounced subject. But why should child labour be banned? Human under age of 15 are considered as children. Most of the developing countries are mainly related in agricultural based work and their population growth rate is very high and also low economic growth rate so a large number of children are engaged in various fields of work. Poverty leads many children to work in many places. In developing countries, per capita income is very low so in those countries, children have to work for their own livelihood. In many families of developing countries, children are the only earning member so there is no alternatives of child labour in this situation. Similarly there are numbers of fact for which child labour should not be banned in developing countries. It has also great contribution in Gross Domestic Production (GDP) and it plays an important role in developing countries to remove poverty.

In developing countries, child labour has a great contribution in Gross Domestic Production (GDP). The children work in various fields in work force in developing countries. They are mainly engaged in agricultural fields, small industries, restaurant, and also work in house. If we see the original scenario of developing countries then we can understand that from the very early age, children are related with several types of work. They do these kinds of work for their family and their own purpose. Through this way, they are also contributing in Gross Domestic Production (GDP). Bangladesh is a good example of developing countries. If we see the statistical data of participation rate of child labour then we can easily understand about the Gross Domestic Production (GDP) contribution made by them. According to Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS), (2002), Table 7.11, 38% of labour in the GDP is contributed by child labourer whos aged from 10 to 14 years. Another example can be African countries where child labour

65105855.doc 3 is the heart of their Gross Domestic Production (GDP). According to Ernest Harsch (October 2001), Child Labour Rooted In Africas Poverty from Africa Recovery Vol. 15 #3 page 14, from http://www.un.org/ecosocdev/geninfo/afrec/vol15no3/153chil4.html, 80 million children are now work across the Africa and it will be 100 million by 2015. So we can understand the contribution of child labour in the GDP of the developing countries.

Small industries are a very popular business in developing countries as it needs small capital to start and operate. There are various types of small industries where firms need a large amount of labour to work in their business with little wages. In this sector, child labour also has a good contribution. Normally in small industries, firms do not need highly skilled person rather they need those types of labourer who agree to work with a little amount of wage. So, child labour is very popular in this sector.

Economy of a developing country mainly depends on its agricultural sector as the country does not have enough infrastructures and equipment of other sectors and business properly. Another fact is agriculture sector needs huge amount of labour to complete the total process of cultivation. As a result, many child labourers have to work in the agriculture field. Generally, children of developing countries start their work in agriculture land from very early age as a helping hand of their parents. In rural area where agriculture is the only earning source, the parents want more male children so that children can help them in their work. So, we can not separate the agriculture from child labour because they are related with each other. In the aspect of Bangladeshi, it is very easy to identify the children contribution in agriculture sector of developing countries. According to Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (2002), Table 7.14, 64.2% of total child labour is contributed in agriculture sector and 35.8% in non-agriculture sector. So it is very easy to realize the actual situation of child labour in agriculture sector.

65105855.doc 4 Poverty is the major fact of child labour. It is the origin of child labour. Poor parents send their children to work since they are not earning enough wages for their livelihood by themselves. Furthermore, for most children, their earnings contribute to give their school fees. If we were to ban child labour, children would not be able to earn a wage and many families will become too poor to survive as well as they can also not able to be educated because of the decrease in their income. A survey of Wikipedia (n.d.), In Free Encyclopedia, Wikipedia Online, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/poverty, shows that 41.09% in Sub-Saharan Africa, 39.84% in South and East Asia, 8.64% in Latin America and Caribbean, 1.47% in Middle East and North Africa, and 0.95% in Europe and Central Asia, people are living under poverty line. Not only that, according to the World Bank definition (2001), from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/poverty, 1.1 billon people are living who earn less than $1 per day and it is called extreme poverty, 2.7 billion people are living who earn less than $2 per day. If we look at a chart of people who earn less than $1 per day, we see that in 2001 around 25% of the world population were living who earned less than $1 per day but it was almost 41% in 1981. This tells us that the rate of extreme poverty has decreased because of child labour. Extreme poverty mainly exists in Africa and South-East Asia where child labour has a great contribution in their economy. If we were to ban child labour, many of them will not able to survive anymore because they will face cuts of their income. In addition, if there is a law to ban child labour and children will continue working then they will not be protected by the law anymore which is even more detrimental to their working conditions. So, if we were to ban child labour, the poverty rate will increase much more and in some regions such as South-East Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa, children as well as their families will not able to survive.

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Figure 1: Percentage of people who living on less than $1 per day in different region of world. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/poverty Another important reason for child labour is that economic setbacks give new strength to the supply of the child labour. The most present example lies in the evidence that the global fall in child labour is being reversed in African countries where number of child labourer is bigger because African people are affected by many dreadful diseases such as HIV/ AIDS. According to UNAIDS (November 20, 2007), 2007 AIDS Epidemic Update, Table 3, Page# 13, from http://www.unaids.org/en/KnowledgeCentre/HIVData/EpiUpdate/EpiUpdArchive/2007/d efault.asp, 30.6 to 36.1 million people in Africa are affected by HIV and 1.9 to 2.4 million people are died of AIDS in Africa. As a result, many children become orphaned and they are bound to work. Parents are withdrawing their children from school and sending them to work to earn their livelihood because in households parents are suffering long periods of illness or facing dramatic cuts in their income and forced to sale their assets. If they do not send their children to work, they will not get food. According to UNICEF (n.d.), Child Labour, from http://www.unicef.org/protection/index_childlabour.html, 250 million children aged from 2 to 17 are working as child labour. 158 million of them are aged from 5 to 14 and 69 million of them are in Sub-Saharan Africa and 44 million of them in South Asia. If child labour is banned, those children as well as their family will fall into economic problem. On the other hand, child labourers are working in various fields such as coffee

65105855.doc 6 cultivation land in Africa, if we were to ban child labour, producers will be bound to hire an adult worker with high wage than a child labourer as a result they will increase the price of the product or they will reduce the production of the product. It will affect developing countries economic growth rate as well as world economy.

Street children are also another major reason for which child labour should not be banned. There are many children in the world who are living as street children. They come on the street for various reasons. Many of the street children lost their parents at the early period of their life. As a result, they have to come on the street because of surviving the life. If they do not do that, they will become food less. Another reason of coming on the street is that many children lost their parents and they are the elder children in their family so they need to work to earn money so that they can provide food to other members of their family. In Bangladesh, according to Aparajeyo-Bangladesh (September 2001), Information About Street Children- Bangladesh, Consortium For Street Children, from http://www.streetchildren.org.uk/resources/details/? country=35&type=country, 4,45,226 children are living as street child of which 75% are in Dhaka city, and 53% are boys, 47% girls. According to Peter Anthony Kopoka (Ph.D), Institute of Development Studies, University of Dar-Es-Salaam, The Problem of Street Children In Africa: An Ignored Tragedy, from http://www.fiuc.org/iaup/ssi/PDFdoc/IDS-doc/Streetchildren.pdf, 10 million children are living without parents and most of them are living as street children in Africa. If we were to ban child labour, this huge number of children have to work illegally and they will not protected by law anymore and it will not create more detrimental in their working conditions.

There are some arguments against child labour. One of those is that children can not get chance for education as they work all through the day. But if we look at the children who are working as child labour, we will find many of them are working for their schooling. According to Astrid Haas (2008), Should Child Labour Be Banned? Retrieved May 18, 2008, from http://www.igloo.com, Many children are working for contribution in their

65105855.doc 7 family income as well as for their schooling. Parents send their children to work to earn their school fees because education fees are too high. Health issue is another debatable subject. The environment of working place is not standard for children because many factories use unhealthy materials such as chemicals. If we consider the health issue, one question is raised that are poor children getting standard quality health rights now? Yes, it is true that we have to provide a sound health environment for them in their working place but it is not a good reason of banning child labour because high population growth is an increasing problem for developing countries as it leads to poverty and many people will not able to live without child labour. In addition, in many families, children are the only earning member for their family because in many cases they lose their parents in very early period of their life. So, in order to remove poverty, children have to work in their own field and other field to earn money for their livelihood and they have to work as they have no alternatives.

In conclusion, It can be said that in developing countries, the economic condition of those countries is not so good so if we say that government of developing countries should take necessary steps to remove child labour, it will not work right way because government of developing countries can not afford it. Another fact is that child labour has great contribution to Gross Domestic Production (GDP) of developing countries and it helps to remove the poor economic condition of a child labourer as well as the country and it also helps children to get education. So, child labour should not be banned in developing countries but it is needed to provide sound health working environment, basic education with working, and basic other rights of children.

Note: n.d. in the bracket after author name means to no data of publication.

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References
Aparajeyo-Bangladesh, Consortium For Street Children, from http://www.streetchildren.org.uk/resources/details/?country=35&type=country Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS): Child labour statistics 2002, Table 7.11. Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS): Child labour statistics 2002, Table 7.14 Haas, Astrid: Child Labour Should Be Banned? Retrieve on May 18, 2008 in http://www.igloo.com Harsch, Ernest; (October 2001), Child Labour Rooted In Africas Poverty: Africa Recovery, Vol. 15, Page 14, http://www.un.org/ecosocdev/geninfo/afrec/vol15no3/153chil4.html Peter Anthony Kopoka (Ph.D): Institute of Development Studies, University of Dar-EsSalaam, The Problem of Street Children In Africa: An Ignored Tragedy, from http://www.fiuc.org/iaup/ssi/PDF-doc/IDS-doc/Streetchildren.pdf UNIAIDS: 2007 AIDS Epidemic Update, table 3, page# 13, from http://www.unaids.org/en/KnowledgeCentre/HIVData/EpiUpdate/EpiUpdArchive/2007/d efault.asp UNICEF: Child Labor, http://www.unicef.org/protection/index_childlabour.html Wikipedia: Free Encyclopedia Wikipedia Online, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/poverty World Bank: definition (2001), http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/poverty