Entries by Reid Maki

Roadblocks to Child Labor Elimination in India

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VASUDHA VENUGOPAL [from The Hindu 2.13.2012] The HinduA child at a brick kiln in Tiruvallur. Photo: B. Jothi Ramalingam Every evening on the Marina, 10-year-old Karunakaran is among the several who urge visitors to buy a packet of pattani sundal. Around 5 p.m., he returns home from school, picks up the basket of 50 sundal packets and rushes to the beach eagerly looking for a ‘certain anna’ who lets him play snake game on his mobile phone. In Pudupet, another boy, Raj, struggles with bolts at an automotive spare-part manufacturing unit. ‘Fifteen’ he says in a seemingly trained way, the moment you ask him anything about his age. Originally from Rajasthan, he really hopes to get out of the unit, and be employed in a house, “like my cousin, a 14-year-old who works in a house in George Town here.” Anything that interferes with the development of the child – that is the UN definition of Child Labour. And by this standard there are innumerable children in and around the city, employed in various professions, some grappling to come out, and some with no control over the situation. The Labour Department has been regularly sending teams to industrial units to rescue child labourers but sources feel there is a concerted effort against such drives from employers who often manage to get […]

More than 150 Groups Urged U.S. to Implement Child Safety Rules for Agriculture But U.S. DOL Succumbs to Political Pressure from Farm Lobby and Withdraws Proposed Protections

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[The CLC submitted the following letter to Secretary Solis, urging her to implement the first update of occupational child safety rules for agriculture in four decades. The letter was originally submitted in March with 105 signatories. This update had 156 organizational endorsements. Unfortunately, the Department of Labor withdrew the proposed rules in late April under strong pressure from the Farm Lobby .] April 19, 2012 The Honorable Hilda L. Solis Secretary U.S. Department of Labor 200 Constitution Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20210 RE: Updates to the Agricultural Hazardous Occupations Orders as Proposed by the Department of Labor Dear Secretary Solis: The Child Labor Coalition represents millions of Americans, including teachers, workers, farmworkers, farmworker advocates, and human rights activists concerned about the safety, education, and welfare of children who work in agriculture. We understand the needs of our nation’s farmworker families and have seen the effects of agricultural work, especially on children. The Coalition, along with the organizations listed below, support the proposed changes to the agricultural hazardous orders and implore the Department to implement the changes as quickly as possible. As many as 500,000 children and teenagers toil in agriculture, an industry consistently ranked as one of the most dangerous industries in America. Last year, 12 of the 16 children under age 16 who suffered fatal occupational injuries worked in […]

Hershey Announces Plans to Reinforce Cocoa Sustainability in West Africa

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FBR Staff Writer Published 31 January 2012 The Hershey Company, the US-based chocolate manufacturer, plans to invest $10m over the next five years in West Africa, in programs to lower child labor and improve farming communities, as a part of its plan to reinforce cocoa sustainability efforts. The company plans to work with experts in agriculture, community development and government, and by 2017, Hershey’s public and private partnerships are expected to directly benefit 750,000 African cocoa farmers and over two million people in cocoa communities across the region. The Hershey Company president and CEO JP Bilbrey said the company is extending its commitment with new programs to drive long-term change in cocoa villages where families will benefit from the company’s investments in education, health and economic opportunities. “Our global consumers want The Hershey Company to be a leader in responsible business practices and in finding smart ways to benefit cocoa communities,” Bilbrey added. Hershey plans to partner with Rainforest Alliance, a non-governmental organization (NGO), to train cocoa farmers to help them address global climate change and adapt to its impacts. Later this year, the company will launch Hershey’s Bliss products with 100% cocoa from Rainforest Alliance Certified farms – the farms which have met comprehensive sustainability standards that protect the environment and ensure the well-being of workers, their families and communities. […]

CLC/NCL letter to USA Today on Hazardous Occupations Orders for U.S. Agriculture Published

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Standards cover hazardous work USA TODAY’s article “Updated federal regulations target kids’ work on farms” strove for balance, but readers might be left with the impression that the proposed safety rules are overly intrusive and that the government is picking on agriculture. The fact is that agriculture is exempted from most child labor laws, and children can work for wages at 12. The occupational safety regulations for agriculture have not been significantly updated for four decades, and the Department of Labor (DOL) is simply trying to move agriculture closer to the protection level offered by all other industries, which require individuals to be 18 before they can perform hazardous work. DOL has carefully focused on the most hazardous farm activities. The tasks 14-year-old Austin performs in the article’s accompanying photo gallery would all be allowed under the new rules because he is working on his parents’ farm and has a blanket exemption. And he could do all of the tasks on any farm with one exception: Before he could drive a tractor on another farm, he would need to take a comprehensive safety course first or turn 16. The farm community should embrace these rules because they will save lives and prevent many serious injuries. Reid Maki; Director of Social Responsibility and Fair Labor Standards; National Consumers League; Washington, D.C.

At the Deep End: Child Labor in Fisheries

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from Malaya Business Insight, PHILIPPINES FILIPINO children work in extremely hazardous fisheries. The most notorious and extremely dangerous of deep sea jobs is in muro-ami which employs children as swimmers and divers using nets to fish in reefs. Called reef hunters, they dive for fish or free snagged nets. The perception is that their smaller bodies are better for diving deeper and that their fingers are nimble to hook and unhook nets. The job is called by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) extremely hazardous child labor in a country where, it estimates, as much as 5 percent of children work in fisheries. Child divers risk ear damage, injuries from falls, shark attacks, snake bites and drowning, says the International Labor Organization (ILO).

India’s Exploited Child Cotton Workers

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By Humphrey HawksleyBBC News, Gujarat Civil rights activist Jignesh Mevani describes the conditions endured by India’s child cotton workers The noise was deafening and air in the factory in northern Gujarat was so thick with cotton dust it was like a snowstorm at night. Women and girls, some no more than 10 or 11, fed machines with raw cotton picked from the nearby fields. It is a process known as ginning – one end of a commercial supply chain that ends up as clothes and textiles in high street shops around the world. Globally, annual revenues from the industry are measured in the trillions of dollars. Many household-name retailers concede they do not know exactly how the cotton they use is farmed and processed. Yet, for years, labour activists here have campaigned for their help. Missing parents “The workers’ lives are terrible,” said Jignesh Mevani, an activist who was our guide. “They are not paid the minimum wage. There are no safety precautions. There are many children.”

High Price of Gold is Child Slave Labor

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JEANETTE PAVINI’S BUYER BEWARE [from MarketWatch] By Jeanette Pavini Award-winning broadcast journalist and author Jeanette Pavini writes the Buyer Beware column for MarketWatch and wants to hear your stories, questions, problems and complaints. Write to her at BuyerBewareMKTW@gmail.com . SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) — Gold has been one of the greatest investment stories of the past decade, and its safe-haven appeal is likely to continue, with demand remaining solid for physical gold and gold jewelry. But regardless of the price gyrations in gold futures and demand, do we really know what the cost of gold is in human terms? The surge in demand for physical gold has not only polished the fortunes of large mining companies, but has also driven a modern-day gold rush: The United Nations estimates there are between 15 million and 20 million gold miners in more than 70 countries worldwide. What consumers need to be aware of is where the gold GLD -0.07%   and gold jewelry they purchase originates from. For the most part, gold comes from large-scale industrial mining operations which require skilled labor. Large mining operations in developing country can spur economic growth for the region. But some artisanal and small-scale mining operations, known as ASMs, operate in poorer regions and places where child exploitation and human trafficking is common.

Child Labor Coalition Announces Top 10 Child Labor Stories of 2011

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List Points to Some of 2012’s Child Labor Priorities Washington, DC—Advocates from the Child Labor Coalition (CLC), a group representing more than two dozen organizations concerned with protecting working youth, has released a list of the top ten child labor stories from 2011. The list represents international and American issues in child labor that received considerable attention in 2011 and what advocates hope is an increase in attention to exploitation faced by vulnerable child workers that has previously gone unnoticed by mainstream media. “The year brought some much needed attention to serious child labor problems in the supply chains of some of the world’s largest companies,” said Reid Maki, Coordinator of the Child Labor Coalition and the Director of Social Responsibility and Fair Labor Standards for the National Consumers League (NCL). “However, we also saw a disturbing move in a few states to roll back long-standing child labor protections and a much-publicized attack on child labor laws by a presidential candidate. The year’s 10 biggest stories, according to the CLC, included (in no particular order): Apple acknowledges that child labor contributed to the making of iPhones and other electronic gadgets in its Chinese factories. In February, Apple announced that it had found 91 children worked at its suppliers in 2010—a nine-fold increase from the previous year. The company also acknowledged […]

DOL on its Proposed Child-Safety Rules for U.S. Agriculture

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In September 2011, the Department of Labor proposed a rule to increase protections for workers age 15 and younger who are employed in agriculture. There are many misconceptions about how the rule would affect young agricultural workers. Deputy Administrator of the Wage and Hour Division Nancy Leppink answers three pressing questions about it. Why was this rule proposed? “Studies show that young workers are significantly more likely to die or suffer a serious injury while performing agricultural work than in any other industry. Agricultural workers ages 15-17 have a risk of fatality that is four times greater than that of the average 15- to 17-year-old. The proposed rule targets the tasks that are most likely to result in death or serious injury.” How would the rule affect small family farms? “The proposed rule would not affect children working on family farms owned by their parents. A child of any age may perform any job at any time on a farm owned by his or her parent. A child of any age may perform any job on a farm operated, but not owned, by his or her parent, but only outside of school hours.” Would the rule prohibit all agricultural work for minors? “The department recognizes the valuable role of agricultural work in promoting a sense of responsibility and stewardship for […]

Rick Montgomery Kansas City Star Response

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Rick Montgomery’s January 2nd  piece, “Proposed Changes to Child Labor Law Could Affect Life on the Farm,” fails to note that the proposed Department of Labor (DOL) protections could save 50-100 kids from dying on farms over the next decade, according to the estimates of the Child Labor Coalition.  Agriculture is the most dangerous industry in which large numbers of kids work, and the proposed regulations are long overdue, representing the first significant update of child labor safeguards for agriculture in 40 years. The protections are necessary because of widespread exemptions to child labor laws that agriculture enjoys and will continue to enjoy. The “parental exemption,” for example, will continue to exempt from coverage kids working on their parents’ farm. Children will still be allowed to work on farms at the age of 12 as long as the work task is not known to be especially hazardous by DOL. We would ask farm families, isn’t preventing 50-100 child deaths worth some minor inconveniences? This summer two 17-year-old boys lost their legs in a grain augur in Oklahoma. The proposed protections would apply some common sense protections and save thousands of teen workers from needless pain and suffering.