child labor – Page 11 – Stop Child Labor

Global March condemns attack on Child Rights activists in Delhi

March 17, 2011/in India/by Reid Maki

Global March has learned that Chairperson Kailash Satyarthi and four other child rights activists have been injured during a rescue effort to save child bonded labourers from zari embroidery units in an area of New Delhi, India. The BBA rescue team, led by BBA Founder Kailash Satyarthi, was attacked by a group of local people and employers, some armed with knives. The four injured members of the rescue team have been hospitalised and two vehicles were also damaged in the attack.

BBA had secured the release of children through the appropriate legal channels and the rescue team was accompanied by the Sub-Divisional Magistrate of Gandhinagar. However, the police presence, consisting of only three officers and no senior officer, was too small given the sensitivity of the area and the tensions that were running high on the street. BBA had informed the police well in advance of the rescue attempt to try and ensure an adequate police presence for protection not only of its own team, but also the children being rescued.

Hundreds of people gathered as the rescue team emerged from the work premises with the children to transport them to safety and freedom. It was at this point that the group was attacked and the children were snatched away from the rescue team. The three police officers were overwhelmed and could not control the mob, becoming mere spectators of the violent attack. This is the third time in a span of five months and second time this week that BBA teams have been attacked during rescue operations. In addition, the BBA office was broken into and ransacked in November 2010.

Speaking following the attack, Kailash Satyarthi said: “Thousands of children are trafficked and enslaved in the capital of Delhi. In spite of strong directions by the Delhi High Court, human rights activists are attacked indiscriminately and are unable to gain cooperation from law enforcement agencies. The employers concerned and some sections of society appear to believe themselves to be above the law and carry out these attacks without fear of retribution.”

He continued: “These attacks are becoming more violent and more frequent and this cannot be allowed to continue. Human rights defenders need to be protected in their work. BBA will continue its important work to tackle child exploitation wherever it occurs and to work towards a society where children can live in freedom and safety and benefit from their fundamental rights. We will not be deterred in our mission by mindless violence and ignorance and we call on like-minded organisations around the world and all decent members of society to support global efforts to end child enslavement and child labour.”

For more information https://www.bba.org.in/news/170311.php

—
Abha Khanna
Communication Officer
Global March Against Child Labour International Secretariat

Tragedy in Southern Illinois Reinforces Farm Safety Reminders

March 7, 2011/in Young Worker Deaths & Injuries/by Reid Maki

from Illinois Corn

https://www.ilcorn.org/daily-update/132-tragedy-in-southern-illinois-reinforces-farm-safety-reminders/

In an incredibly unfortunate turn of events last week, two southern Illinois teens died in a tragic accident on a farm, the victims of electrocution. Our thoughts and prayers center on the affected families at this time. In this time of loss, IL Corn hopes that everyone will remember the price paid by these two young men and invest in your own families and employees the time needed to properly handle on-farm safety issues.

Yesterday marked the beginning of National Farm Safety Week. “Growing the Most Important Crop,” this year’s theme, focuses on making farms and ranches safer for farmers, their family members and employees with special emphasis on children.

People of all ages, but particularly children, are at risk of injuries on the farm. With more than 1 million youth living on farms, reaching out to adults with information on how they can reduce risks to the children in their care is critical to preventing farm and ranch incidents and fatalities.

More than half of young people living on farms and ranches pitch in doing chores, with those age 10 to 15 helping the most. Another 307,000 youth not living on farms are hired as employees each year.

According to the National Children’s Center for Rural and Agricultural Health and Safety, the rate of childhood agricultural injuries has declined by nearly 60 percent over the last decade or so but many children still die in farm accidents every year in the U.S. and others are injured, often seriously. Youth fatalities on farms were most often attributed to machinery (including tractors), followed by motor vehicles including all-terrain vehicles. Falls accounted for 40 percent of non-fatal youth injuries on farms.

The tragic electrocution death of the southern Illinois teenagers is drawing national attention to the need for safety precautions when working with long and tall equipment near overhead power lines. The southern Illinois 18 year- olds were working to free a raccoon, which had crawled inside an aluminum pipe used for irrigation, when the pipe touched an overhead electric wire. When the teens hoisted the 31 foot pipe into the air, the wind pushed it into the wire. They became the path to the ground for the electricity and both were fatally injured from the deadly voltage.

The increasing size of farm equipment raises the risk of contact at field entries and along end rows, where overhead electric wires may be present. The taller equipment may not always allow the recommended 10 foot separation when passing beneath or near the power lines. In agricultural areas the vertical clearance required is less than the clearance over roadways and streets. Never assume that because the machinery passed under the lines in one area means it will adequately clear another area.

Any part of an implement that can touch a power line offers a potential path to the ground for the electric current. Farm equipment operators who are working on the ground with the equipment can become the path for the deadly current flow. Such equipment not only includes large tillage equipment, but antennas, grain augers, auger wagons, and truck beds with hydraulic lifts.

GoodWeave and Your Carpet Choice Can Help Improve Child Labor Standards

March 2, 2011/in Corporations and Child Labor, Rugs/by Reid Maki

Julia Moulden/Huffington Post

My column runs on Saturdays, so you’re likely reading this on the weekend. Are you barefoot, and luxuriating in soft carpeting under your toes as you relax? And did you know that you can influence whether the rugs you buy for your home and office are made with child labour or not?

Well, with a little help from the folks at GoodWeave, you can. GoodWeave certifies child-labour-free rugs and provides education and opportunities for children who are rescued as well as those at risk. Read more

US Labor Department Fines Marcus Theatres, Regal Cinemas and Wehrenberg movie theatre chains more than $277,000 for Child Labor Violations

March 1, 2011/in Corporations and Child Labor, Youth Employment/by Reid Maki

WHD News Release: [03/01/2011]

Contact Name: Scott Allen or Rhonda Burke

Release Number: 11-0247-NAT

Minors in 9 states found performing hazardous work, working longer hours than permitted by law

CHICAGO — The U.S. Department of Labor has assessed a total of $277,475 in civil money penalties against three movie theatre companies, Marcus Theatre Corp., Regal Cinemas Inc. and Wehrenberg Inc., for allowing dozens of teens to perform hazardous jobs and work longer hours than allowed by the youth employment provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act.

The Labor Department’s Wage and Hour Division, through a strategic enforcement initiative aimed at curbing violations in an industry found to have a high rate of non-compliance with child labor laws, discovered approximately 160 minors were being required to perform hazardous jobs — such as operating paper balers and trash compactors, operating motor vehicles, using power driven mixers and baking — in theatres owned by the three chains. Marcus Theatre Corp. also allowed youth to work beyond permitted hours. The 27 theatres where the minors were employed are in nine states: California, Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, Ohio, South Carolina and Wisconsin. Read more

Consumer-labor group calls bizarre Missouri Senate bill to reduce child labor protections something ‘out of Charles Dickens novel’

February 24, 2011/in State Laws, Viewpoints/by Reid Maki

For release: February 24, 2011

Washington, DC—The National Consumers League (NCL), the organization which helped pass federal child labor laws in the United States more than 70 years ago, is calling a Missouri bill to bring back child labor “straight out of a Charles Dickens novel.” The 112-year-old NCL is condemning a bill introduced in the Missouri state Senate by Republican Jane Cunningham that would eliminate the prohibition on employment of children under age 14.

“Labor crusader Florence Kelley would be rolling over in her grave,” said NCL Executive Director Sally Greenberg. “This is a new low,” said Greenberg. “Those who are attacking labor and worker protections are now apparently willing to put children back into factories or coal mines.”

Liberian Union Receives Child Labor Award

February 23, 2011/in Liberia/by Reid Maki

by SANDRA POLASKI

I want to tell you about the remote town of Harbel, Liberia and the Firestone Agricultural Workers Union of Liberia (FAWUL), which has worked tirelessly to improve the lives of workers and their children. The union just won the Department of Labor’s 2010 Iqbal Masih Award, an award that Congress established to recognize extraordinary efforts to end the worst forms of child labor. This award is given in remembrance of Iqbal Masih, a Pakistani child carpet weaver who was sold into slavery at the age of four. He escaped his servitude to become an outspoken advocate against child labor before losing his life at the age of 13. Read more

26 Child Laborers from Bihar Rescued in Delhi

February 16, 2011/in India/by Reid Maki

(PTI) Twenty-six child labourers trafficked from Bihar were rescued and eight employers detained by authorities from south Delhi.

The Delhi Police and the task force against child labour conducted the rescue operation in Jamia Nagar area yesterday, said an official of child rights NGO Bachpan Bachao Andolan (BBA), representatives of which also took part in the raid. Read more

Apple Report Reveals Child Labor Increase

February 15, 2011/in China, Corporations and Child Labor, Electronic Equipment, Electronics, In Our Products/by Reid Maki

Tania Branigan in Beijing

Apple’s annual report says 91 children worked at its suppliers in 2010, and 137 workers were poisoned by n-hexane

Apple said it had strengthened its checks on age because of concerns about falsification.

Apple found more than 91 children working at its suppliers last year, nine times as many as the previous year, according to its annual report on its manufacturers.

The US company has also acknowledged for the first time that 137 workers were poisoned at a Chinese firm making its products and said less than a third of the facilities it audited were complying with its code on working hours.

Apple usually refuses to comment on which firms make its goods, but came under increased scrutiny last year following multiple suicides at electronics giant Foxconn, one of its main suppliers.

Last month, anti-pollution activists accused the firm of being more secretive about its supply chain in China than almost all of its rivals.

The report says Apple found 91 children working at 10 facilities. The previous year it found 11 at three workplaces.

It ordered most to pay the children’s education costs but fired one contractor which was using 42 minors and had “chosen to overlook the issue”, the company said. It also reported the vocational school that had arranged the employment to the authorities for falsifying student IDs and threatening retaliation against pupils who revealed their ages.

Apple said it had strengthened its checks on age because of concerns about the falsification of ages by such schools and labour agencies. It also audited 127 facilities last year, mostly for the first time, compared with 102 in 2009.

The report shows a marked decrease in compliance on working hour requirements of a maximum 60-hour week with one day off. In 2009, only 46% met the standard; last year that fell to 32%.

Only 57% were compliant with its code on preventing working injuries and 70% or fewer met standards on air emissions, managing hazardous substances, and environmental permits and reporting.

But there were some signs of improvement in other areas. Compliance on wages and benefits improved from 65% in 2009 to 70%.

The report also says that 137 workers at a Suzhou supplier were poisoned by n-hexane, a hydrocarbon, last year. Previous reports had indicated 62 employees were affected and Apple had declined to answer repeated queries about the incident.

A spokesperson said it had “provided more transparency” regarding the company and Foxconn given recent concerns.

The report said Apple was “disturbed and deeply saddened” by the Foxconn deaths. Apple’s chief operating officer, Tim Cook, and other executives went to Shenzhen to see the facilities and the firm commissioned an independent review of conditions.

“I think it is positive that after such a long delay Apple has finally acknowledged the [n-hexane] problem,” said Ma Jun of the Institute for Public and Environmental Affairs, one of the organisations that criticised the US firm last month.

But he added: “This report shows that Apple is still not ready to accept public scrutiny … We have listed the names of some Apple suppliers but there is no mention of them [here].”

Debby Chan, of Hong Kong’s Students and Scholars Against Corporate Misbehaviour campaign, said there was no way for others to monitor the behaviour of suppliers because Apple would not identify them or even say how many it had.

“I regard this report as a means of image-building rather than ensuring compliance with labour rights,” she added.

Apple said that immigrant workers in countries such as Malaysia had been reimbursed $3.4m (£2.1m) in “exorbitant” recruitment fees since 2008 thanks to its checks. It has also increased efforts to crack down on the use of potential conflict minerals and expanded social responsibility training.

It is unusual in publishing its audit report and said 40% of the facilities audited last year said Apple was the first company to check them for social responsibility compliance.

The report also said that 99% of facilities met its freedom of association requirements.

But independent unions are not allowed on the Chinese mainland and Geoff Crothall, of Hong Kong’s China Labour Bulletin, said: “It is Henry Ford-style freedom of association: You can have any union as long as it is [in] the Associated Federation of Trade Unions.”

Last month, Apple reported record profits of $6bn for the fourth quarter of 2010.

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Apple’s child labour issues worsen

Apple, the technology giant, has admitted that child labour is a growing problem at the factories which manufacture its computers, iPods and mobile phones.

In one factory it had found 42 children working on the production line and has now terminated its contract.

[The Telegraph]

Apple said that 91 children under the age of 16 were discovered to be working last year in ten Chinese factories owned by its suppliers.

By comparison, in 2009, Apple said eleven underage workers had been discovered.

“In recent years, Chinese factories have increasingly turned to labour agencies and vocational schools to meet their workforce demands,” said Apple’s report.

“We learned that some of these recruitment sources may provide false IDs that misrepresent young people’s ages, posing challenges for factory management,” it added.

In response, Apple said it had “intensified” its search for workers under 16, the minimum legal working age in China. In one factory it had found 42 children working on the production line and has now terminated its contract. Apple said it decided that the management “had chosen to overlook the issue and was not committed to addressing the problem.”

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Loopholes ‘put UK children at risk’

[from the Belfast Telegraph]

The legacy of years of indifference to child sex tourism is putting British children at risk, according to a report.

Ecpat UK, which campaigns to stop child abuse, also warned that paedophiles convicted of offences against children abroad are escaping UK sanctions because of loopholes in the British legal system.

Home Secretary Theresa May should act to close a loophole which enables sex offenders to travel abroad for up to three days without informing the authorities, Ecpat UK said.

Director Christine Beddoe said the charity was “deeply concerned” that “the legacy of years of indifference to child sex tourism is placing British children at risk”.

“Data about British sex offenders abroad is patchy, rarely shared between authorities and it is uncertain how much ever gets on to the UK criminal records data base,” she said.

“The Government simply don’t know how many British sex offenders have been prosecuted abroad and then slip back into the UK undetected.

“Despite their ongoing risk to children and the fact that many of these individuals are known to authorities both in the UK and in the country in which the abuse took place, these individuals often fall off the radar.”

Its report – Off The Radar: Protecting Children From British Sex Offenders Who Travel – also called for a cross-Government strategy to deal effectively with the investigation and prosecution of child sexual offences committed abroad.

It went on: “We are concerned about the vulnerability of children in international schools and orphanages because of the lack of information-sharing between jurisdictions, and the fact that international organisations are unable to access the criminal records-checking procedures that would be expected as standard procedure by UK institutions.”

Ecpat UK stands for End Child Prostitution, Child Pornography and the Trafficking of children for sexual purposes.

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Reid Maki/CLC Coordinator

reidm@nclnet.org/202.207.2820

A dozen nations added to U.S. Government child, forced labor list (AP)

December 16, 2010/in Angola, Central African Republic, Chad, Child Labor - International, El Salvador, Ethiopia, In Our Products, India, Lesotho, Madagascar, Mozambique, Namibia, News & Events, Rwanda, U.S. DOL, Zambia, Zimbabwe/by Reid Maki

WASHINGTON — The Labor Department is adding a dozen countries to the list of nations that use child labor or forced labor, as officials warn the global economic crisis could cause an upswing in the exploitation of children and other workers.

From coffee grown in El Salvador to sapphires mined in Madagascar, the agency’s latest reports, to be released Wednesday, identify 128 goods from 70 countries where child labor, forced labor or both are used in violation of international standards.

“Shining light on these problems is a first step toward motivating governments, the private sector and concerned citizens to take action to end these intolerable abuses that have no place in our modern world,” said Labor Secretary Hilda Solis.

New to the list are Angola, Central African Republic, Chad, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Lesotho, Madagascar, Mozambique, Namibia, Rwanda, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

U.S. DOL Proposes Revisions to List of Products Made from Forced or Indentured Child Labor

December 14, 2010/in Child Labor - International, Chocolate, Cotton, In Our Products/by Reid Maki

Initial Determination Proposing Revisions to the EO 13126 List

On December 15, 2010 the Department of Labor announced an initial determination proposing to update the EO 13126 list in accordance with the “Procedural Guidelines for the Maintenance of the List of Products Requiring Federal Contractor Certification as to Forced or Indentured Child Labor.” The initial determination proposes to add Hand-Woven Textiles from Ethiopia to the list. It also proposes to remove Charcoal from Brazil from the list where, preliminarily, the Department of Labor has reason to believe that the use of forced or indentured child labor has been significantly reduced if not eliminated. On December 16, 2010 DOL published a notice in the Federal Register officially requesting public comment on its initial determination for a period of 60 days. On December 23rd, 2010 DOL published a correction to the December 16th initial determination. DOL will consider all public comments prior to publishing a final determination updating the list of products, made in consultation and cooperation with the Departments of State and Homeland Security. Until publication of the final determination, the current July 20, 2010 list remains valid. [Continue to see the list].

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