Children’s voices and larger commitments needed to end child labour

• Progress was made at IV Global Child Labour Conference, but at the current rate we will not reach the global commitment to eradicate all forms of child labour by 2025

• Children like Justice, 16, from Ghana know what it takes: “Child labour should not be entertained at all. It is legally and morally wrong.”

November 20, 2017–– Governments need to listen to children and make larger commitments to realistically address ending child labour.

That’s the message from World Vision hot on the heels of the International Labour Organization’s IV Global Child Labour Conference in Buenos Aires, Argentina, where there were more than 3500 participants but no children in attendance to take part in the discussions, which were meant to address their rights and needs.

“Lifting the voice of children is an integral part of finding solutions,” said Trihadi Saptoadi, spokesperson for World Vision’s It takes a world to end violence against children campaign.

At the conference, World Vision pledged to collaborate with partners from across industries to ensure children’s proposals are reflected in efforts to end child labour.

Foysel, 15, is a young leader from Bangladesh who is passionate about advocating for children’s rights. “Child labour is a big problem in our country. Children from poor families, street children and orphans are the victims of child labour,” he said in World Vision’s report It Takes Children. “Children are the present and the future citizens of a country. Their rights should be protected at all costs. So all of us must strongly stand against child labour and try hard to ensure a peaceful, carefree and secure world for the children in the country.”

While it was encouraging to see the high-level commitments articulated in the conference’s Buenos Aires Declaration, the world’s children need these commitments to be translated into concrete, coordinated actions – and those who make the promises to be held to account.

"We want to see an end to child labour, but we know it will take accelerated efforts from many partners. Governments must strengthen social and child protection systems and provide quality education for all children. This will to improve income and living conditions for families, and discourage child labour," said Saptoadi. "And it takes more than just governments. Companies have a responsibility to eliminate child labour from their supply chains and globally, we can all demand supply chain transparency."

Despite the progress made at the conference, World Vision says, at the rate we are going, we will fall far short of the global commitment to eradicate all forms of child labour by 2025 and end all forms of violence against children by 2030.

Additional Facts

-1.7 billion children are affected by violence each year

-There are 152 million child labourers

-World Vision’s work with local communities bears strong evidence that child labour has detrimental impacts on children’s rights, health, education and well-being.