[calameo code=00036771632eb1bbe9eca lang=en width=100% height=400]
[calameo code=0003677169b672ed7e358 lang=en width=100% height=400]
| TACLOBAN — The provincial government of Northern Samar will create a committee that will craft measures to wipe out child labor in the province by 2015. … See all stories on this topic » |
 BusinessWorld Online |
Asia and the Pacific still has the largest numbers–almost 78 million or 9.3% of child population, but Sub-Saharan Africa continues to be the region with the highest incidence of child labor–59 million, over 21%).
Source: ILO
By: Gethin Chamberlain
The Observer
Indian workers are paid just 25p an hour and forced to work overtime in factories used by some of Britain’s best-known high street stores
Gap, Next and Marks & Spencer have all launched their own inquiries into abuses of working regulations at their Indian suppliers, which have resulted in children such as six-year-old Bubli being left alone while her parents work. Photograph: Gethin Chamberlain
Some of the biggest names on the British high street are at the centre of a major sweatshop scandal. An Observer investigation has found staff at their Indian suppliers working up to 16 hours a day.
Marks & Spencer, Gap and Next have all launched their own inquiries into the abuses and pledged to end the practice of excessive overtime, which is in flagrant breach of the industry’s ethical trading initiative (ETI) and Indian labour law.
Some workers say they were paid at half the legal overtime rate. Gap, which uses the same factory as Next, confirmed it had found wage violations and gave its supplier a deadline of midnight last night to repay workers who lost out. M&S says it has yet to see evidence to support the wage claims. Read more
by Sula Kim
WVEC.com
POQUOSON — A Poquoson tree trimming company has been fined $185,000 in the November 2009 death of a 14-year-old worker.
Frank Gornick was working for his uncle’s company Old Dominion Tree and Lawn Care Specialists and was on a three-person team doing debris removal following the Nor’easter.
Police said he was using a shovel to drop debris into the wood chipper’s hopper when it got caught in the machine’s blades, dragging him in and killing him instantly.
The Va. Department of Labor and Industry issued its findings Thursday, saying the machine shouldn’t have been used.
“The wooden paddle was missing, the feet control was missing, the lower door hadn’t been installed. There were six things missing,” said Jennifer Wester, Cooperative Programs director.
She says the report concluded a metal shovel was used to put items in the chipper, even though the manufacturer forbids it.
According to Wester, workers weren’t wearing hard hats or eye protection.
The company has 15 days to contest the findings or take action as outlined by the state.
Apple has admitted that child labor was used at the factories that build its computers, iPods and mobile phones.
By Malcolm Moore in Shanghai
Apple has been repeatedly criticized for using factories that abuse workers and where conditions are poor.
At least eleven 15-year-old children were discovered to be working last year in three factories which supply Apple.
The company did not name the offending factories, or say where they were based, but the majority of its goods are assembled in China.
Apple also has factories working for it in Taiwan, Singapore, the Philippines, Malaysia, Thailand, the Czech Republic and the United States.
Apple said the child workers are now no longer being used, or are no longer underage. “In each of the three facilities, we required a review of all employment records for the year as well as a complete analysis of the hiring process to clarify how underage people had been able to gain employment,” Apple said, in an annual report on its suppliers.
Apple has been repeatedly criticized for using factories that abuse workers and where conditions are poor. Last week, it emerged that 62 workers at a factory that manufactures products for Apple and Nokia had been poisoned by n-hexane, a toxic chemical that can cause muscular degeneration and blur eyesight. Apple has not commented on the problems at the plant, which is run by Wintek, in the Chinese city of Suzhou.
Guardian Weekly
By: Claire Colley
In March 2008, Cambodia saw the implementation of a new law entitled: Suppression of Human Trafficking and Sexual Exploitation. Aimed at offering protection to women in prostitution by making the selling of sex illegal, it has resulted in clean-up operations and police raids of red light areas. Women in prostitution are being arrested, reporting police brutality and imprisonment. It’s also resulted in decreased safety for women as brothels are closed down and women are forced into street work. Mei, a young prostitute in Phnom Penh, describes how she fell into prostitution and the horrific experiences she has had as a result of the new law
My name is Mei and I’m 19 years old. I live in Phnom Penh but I’m from a small village in Prey Veng province. I went to school when I was younger, but I had to leave to work in the rice fields when I was 13. My family is poor and when there is no food to eat, you have to do what you must to support them – as I’m the oldest it’s my responsibility. Read more
CLC members—the Ramsay Merriam Fund, the American Federation of Teachers, and the National Education Association—made this web site possible through their generous support.