Child Labor
Outline:
1. Introduction: Child labor is worst kind of exploitation.
2. Poverty is the root cause of child labor.
3. International propaganda against child labor.
4. No country guarantees of subsistence except UK.
5. Developed countries help to eradicate child labor.
6. Some advantages of child labor
7. Conclusion: Technical / vocational institutions should be established.
Child labor is the labor provided by children in factories and other realms of production. It is equated with exploitation, working for long hours under physical and mental conditions of stress and strain. The environments under which children work in factories are the least favorable. Child labor is branded by various names like bonded labor, forced labor etc. There are many causes of child labor in the Third World countries in general and Pakistan in particular.
Economic poverty is the main cause of child labor. Poor parents are compelled to send their children in urban areas to carpet manufacturing sector in Pakistan where they work extremely unfavorable environs. The term 'bonded labor' applies to the children working in different industries, either receiving no money or paltry amount for supplying labor. Likewise, children join motor workshops to become motor mechanics and the process of apprenticeship continues for a fairly long time. During the period of training spreading over a number of decades, they have to remain content with whatever paltry wages they get. In the rural areas, children of primary school age are needed to work on family farms.
The developed countries charge Pakistan for violating human rights of the child labor. Even sports goods, surgical instrument industries are also the target of employing the child labor. Organized propaganda has been started against Pakistan, on the basis of which carpet, sports goods exports are refused to enter into many developed countries. It is pointed out that child labor is employed even in the United States of America, India, Bangladesh, Brazil and Mexico in varying degrees. The evil exists in many of the developed countries, whereas it is practiced in the underdeveloped countries on a comparatively large scale for reasons noted above.
From amongst the human rights, the first right is to live. It is a right of subsistence. Other rights come later. The US has not guaranteed the subsistence rights to its citizens. Subsistence rights are, however, guaranteed in the UK. The US is a violator of the subsistence right and as such it needs to be tried on this account.
The developed nations should force the governments in underdeveloped countries to guarantee subsistence to all the citizens. The economically developed countries a so should enforce subsistence rights in their own land. The developed countries don't bother about this right to be enforced in the poor countries as they are interested in the survival of the poor. Above all, they themselves follow such, economic policies at the international level as to keep the poor in a state of permanent poverty. The developed countries instead of finding fault with the child labor on grounds of human rights violation should endeavor to ensure the observance of the first right to live. If this right were met many of the evils of child labor, would vanish.
While child labor cannot be viewed with equanimity of mind owing to various excesses attached to it. It has, however, some redeeming features. The children get on-the-job training in various technical vocations, and most of them turn out to be good mechanics to earn a good living in time to come. Through experience, they learn the technicalities of their profession. However, if they were to receive the fundamental theoretical knowledge through preliminary training, their performance could immensely improve. The lack of theoretical knowledge is a limiting factor to their efficiency. If this deficiency were overcome, it would go a long way to improve the labor productivity. It calls for making certain arrangements of training for the exposure of labor to basic principles of mechanics.
Arrangements must be made for imparting relevant education and the training of child labor. The government through legislation can effectively control the menace of child labor. It should be made legal binding on the manufacturers to arrange for the technical training of labor. It can be facilitated through the establishment of labor training institutes at different places depending on the nature of localized industries. In Sialkot, the institute can provide theoretical-cum-practical training to labor in sports and surgical instruments manufacture. In Faisalabad, arrangements can be made for the exposure of labor to the basic manufacturing processes in textile sector. This would go a long way to improve the productivity of labor.
The need of the hour is to evolve a comprehensive integrated strategy both at public and private level. It should include the universal primary education, formal and non-formal programs. It should also develop employment generating policy sponsoring of technical institutes for the training of labor.
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