Labour movement launches programme to eliminate child labour

The International Labour Organisation (ILO) this week launched a three year programme aimed at discouraging Malawi tobacco farmers from using child labour. Peter Coleridge, Chief Technical Advisor of the ILO said at the launch of the International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (IPEC) in Lilongwe that the country's tenant system on tobacco farms was perpetuating poverty because children were denied an education by having to work on farms. "Under the tenant farm system, a tenant moves onto a farm and arranges with the landlord of that farm that he'll produce tobacco with his own labour. Now that means he has to use his own family including his children to achieve his objective. The land owner has nothing to do with this because he says, its not his business," Coleridge told IRIN. Recent research by the ILO revealed that children between the ages of five to 16 years are involved in weeding and harvesting of the tobacco crop. This is despite the fact that Malawi offers free primary education to its children. Following an international outcry last year over the use of child labour prompted the local tobacco industry into action after threats of trade sanctions promised to cripple commercial agriculture in the country. Tobacco provides 70 percent of Malawi's foreign exchange earnings. The Tobacco Association of Malawi spearheaded the creation of the Elimination of Child Labour Association following threats by international tobacco buyers to lobby for a blanket ban unless authorities took steps. Coleridge said the IPEC programme was expected to "withdraw" 1,500 children from hazardous work and provide them with social protection. Also, further measures would be taken to prevent 3,000 children at risk from entering the labour market. Country Programme coordinator for ILO Malawi, Michael Mwasikakata, told IRIN: "Withdrawal doesn't make sense if you have no alternative. Under the programme parents would be offered some entrepreneurial training apart from ongoing advocacy and awareness raising to empower them." The areas of focus included increased access to schools for the children, and helping parents acquire micro credit. "Although the focus is on tobacco, the programme will cover other activities in sectors which employ children in hazardous work to avoid children simply moving from commercial agriculture to other probably more hazardous work," Mwasikakata added. Speaking at the launch, Minister of Labour and Vocational Training, Alice Sumani, urged the programme to focus on women. "Three-quarters of the women don't tell the truth to their husbands about how they handle their domestic workers. Women go home [rural villages], find a small girl, take her to town and employ her. At the end of the month, they give her a dress [as a wage]," she said. A preliminary report by the Centre for Social Research (CSR), a research department of the University of Malawi, found that 35 percent of the school going age children in 480 households, were not in school. The number of children engaged in labour, according to official government statistics, was slightly over 100,000, about 3-4 percent of the economically active population. Under the employment act of 2000, the minimum age of employment is 14 years, and those found breaking the law can be jailed for up to five years.