Lanka better off to eliminate child labour

by L. S. A. Wedaarachchi

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Sri Lanka can eliminate child labour since it has a favourable environment to do so compared to other regional countries such as India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Nepal, said the former Chairman, National Child Protection Authority (NCPA) and Adviser NCPA Dr. Hiranthi Wijemanne.

She said that eliminating child labour should be everyone’s business.

In Sri Lanka over half of the children who work are below 15 years and 95 per cent of them are from the rural areas, she said.

“The International Day against child labour falls on June 12. A workshop on “Eliminating child labour” organised by the PANOS Institute Sri Lanka, attended by a team of experts was held at the Sri Lanka Foundation Institute, recently.

Wijemanne told the workshop that 70 per cent of child labourers are doing household work. Explaining the pattern of child labour in Sri Lanka, she said children work in construction sites, textile and garment trade manufacturing and industrial establishments and in the agricultural sector.

Sixty-six per cent boys and thirty-four per cent girls among the working child population did not attend schools. Some children work as “Child beggars” on the streets while some are involved in commercial sex and trafficking and serve as child combatants, she said.

She said that the worst forms of child labour are domestic labour, commercial sexual exploitation of children and recruitment of children as combatants.

“As poverty is the root cause reducing the demand rather than the supply is important.

If no one employs a child, there will be no child labour. Effective law enforcement and effective implementation of compulsory education and easy access to non-formal education will help to eliminate child labour, she said.

Commissioner of Labour, Women’s and Children’s Division of the Department of Labour Pearl Weerasinghe said that children under 14 cannot be employed under the strict rules and regulations.

Stern action will be taken against those who employ children, she said.