Entries by Reid Maki

2 Teen Workers Trapped Inside Grain Bin Die in Illinois

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MOUNT CARROLL, Ill., July 29, 2010 [This brings to 4 the number of young workers who died in grain silos in the Midwest this summer.from CBSNews.com:] Rescuers Drain Thousands of Pounds of Corn to Free Trapped Workers from Bin in Ill.; OSHA Says Accident “Very Preventable” (AP) A grain bin accident that left two teenagers dead and a third hospitalized could have been prevented and preliminary investigations found one worker was underage and employees lacked safety equipment, a federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration spokesman said Thursday. “This was very preventable,” said OSHA spokesman Scott Allen in the Department of Labor’s Chicago office. “There are OSHA regulations that should have been followed and it appears they were not.”

Human Rights Watch Report Exposes “Fields of Peril”

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Fields of Peril Child Labor in US Agriculture May 5, 2010 In this 99-page report Human Rights Watch found that child farmworkers risked their safety, health, and education on commercial farms across the United States. For the report, Human Rights Watch interviewed 59 children under age 18 who had worked as farmworkers in 14 states in various regions of the United States. https://www.hrw.org/node/90126

Brazil’s Bolsa Família How to get children out of jobs and into school The limits of Brazil’s much admired and emulated anti-poverty programme

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ELDORADO, SÃO PAULO STATE THREE generations of the Teixeira family live in three tiny rooms in Eldorado, one of the poorest favelas (slums) of Greater São Paulo, the largest city in the Americas. The matriarch of the family, Maria, has six children; her eldest daughter, Marina, has a toddler and a baby. Like many other households in the favela, the family has been plagued by domestic violence. But a few years ago, helped in part by Bolsa Família (family grant)—which pays mothers a small sum so long as their children stay in education and get medical check-ups—Maria took her children out of child labour and sent them to school. The programme allows the children to miss about 15% of classes. But if a child gets caught missing more than that, payment is suspended for the whole family. The Teixeiras’ grant has been suspended and restarted several times as boy after boy skipped classes. And now the eldest, João, aged 16, is out earning a bit of money by cleaning cars or distributing leaflets, taking his younger brothers with him. Marina’s pregnancies have added to the pressure. She gets no money for her children because she lives with her mother and the family has reached Bolsa Família’s upper limit. After rallying for a while, the Teixeira family is sliding backwards, struggling […]

The U.S., Somalia, and Child Soldiers

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Viewpoint/Elizabeth Gardner I’ve been going through a mental checklist of some of the 12-year-olds that I’ve known. The list includes some extremely rambunctious boys and some spirited girls—my little sister’s friends, an old coach’s son, a family friend, girls that I coached at volleyball camp. It’s these kids that I’ve been thinking back to as I’ve read the recent press that’s come out regarding child soldiers in Somalia.

Senator Harkin Draws Attention to Child Labor in Uzbekistan with Resolution

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S.RES.99 Title: A resolution expressing the sense of the Senate that the Government of Uzbekistan should immediately enforce its existing domestic legislation and fulfill its international commitments aimed at ending state-sponsored forced and child labor. Sponsor: Sen Harkin, Tom [IA] (introduced 4/2/2009)      Cosponsors (2) Latest Major Action: 4/2/2009 Referred to Senate committee. Status: Referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations.

Progress in Two Areas

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The ILO reports that in the four-year period ending in 2008, the number of child laborers among 5- to 14-year-olds fell 10 percent and the number children in hazardous work fell 31 percent.