Children bear the brunt of poverty

Ten-year-old Maksat waves his polish-stained hands in the air as he solicits business on one of the busy streets in the Kyrgyzstan capital, Bishkek. "Baike [which means older brother in Kyrgyz]," he croons at passers-by, "let’s clean your shoes, it is really cheap." Maksat, in his dirty, ragged clothes, told IRIN he earned 50 soms (US $1) a day polishing and shining shoes. He uses the money to buy bread for his family and to buy pencils and notebooks for the two days he attends school every week. Child labour is illegal in Kyrgyzstan, but Maksat is just one of thousands of children forced to work to provide family support. According to the United Nations, more than 55 percent of families live below the poverty line in this Central Asian country. Amina Kurbanova, the social projects manager of SIAR-Bishkek Marketing Research, which has undertaken research for the International Labour Organisation (ILO) on the issue, said there were up to 7,000 children in Bishkek alone working on the streets and in bazaars. There were no government programmes to deal with the problem, she said, and in the capital, there was only one organisation working with street children - The Centre for Children Protection. "When we were doing our research, children were so embittered that they did not want to speak with us. There are no official statistics on how many children work or why they do it. The last official statistics were published in 1999 and stated that only 575 children work. Kurbanova added while the children converged on the capital from various small towns across the country, her research indicated that 70 to 80 percent of them came from towns surrounding the capital. Many of them arrive in the city with their mothers. Aigul Eje, who left Batken with her children to look for work, told IRIN: "My husband has gone to Russia to earn money, I still do not have any news from him. My elder daughter is 14 and she does not study at all. We have to work in order to live. I am selling cigarettes and earning approximately 60-70 soms (US $1.5) per day, but I have to pay for the place where we live. It costs 700 soms (US $14-15). It is not enough, therefore my children work too." One six-year-old boy, Sasha, who told IRIN he did odd jobs, said his mother drinks a lot and has asked him beg if he cannot find work. Another, Ilias, told IRIN he had spent seven years in schools in Talas, east of Bishkek, before coming to the capital with his mother. "Now I have to work to help my mum because I do not have a dad," said the youngster who sells cigarettes, bubblegum and newspapers on the street. According to UNICEF, while children in the cities do odd jobs, those in rural areas too are removed from school at a young age and put to work on farms. The Kyrgyz Children's Fund (KCF) said in a recent report that it was concerned about the growing number of street children in the country, "many of whom have left home because of abusive or alcoholic parents". It said that the living conditions of children, particularly in rural Kyrgyzstan, were deteriorating since the fall of the Soviet Union. In addition, an increasing number of families in the cities were abandoning their children because they were unable to provide for them. "The socioeconomic situation does not effectively ensure decent living conditions for all children. Basic needs for shelter, food, and clothing seldom are met. After independence, vaccine-preventable diseases such as diphtheria, polio and measles re-emerged. A range of serious nutrition-related problems affects a large number of children, especially in rural areas," the report said.