WUNRN
CHILD LABOUR REINFORCES PATTERNS OF
INEQUALITY FOR GIRLS
CHILD LABOUR - INDIA - GIRL BRICK
WORKER
A
9-year-old girl in India toils under the hot sun, making bricks from morning to
night, seven days a week.
ILO - International
Labour Organization
Many girls enter the
workforce at an early age, commonly ending up in the lowest paid and insecure
work, constrained by gender inequality at home and in the workplace. Moreover
many working in the home remain invisible and unaccounted for. The patterns of
inequality are also reflected in education outcomes with 64 per cent of illiterate
adults being women.
__________________________________________________
GENEVA (ILO News) 23
September 2013 A new report by the International Labour Organization (ILO),
Marking Progress Against Child Labour - says that the global number of child
labourers has declined by one third since 2000, from 246 million to 168
million. But even the latest improved rate of decline is not enough to achieve the
goal of eliminating the worst forms of child labour by 2016 agreed by the
international community through the ILO......
__________________________________________________
ILO - International
Labour Organization
CHILD LABOUR - PATTERNS
OF INEQUALITY START YOUNG - GIRLS' RIGHTS - ILO
Statement | 11 October
2012
The ILO welcomes the
special focus on the situation of the girl child on this new UN International
Day of the Girl Child.
Gender inequalities that take root at an early age tend to produce long-term
gender inequality which is reproduced in the world of work.
We are compelled to act to ensure that the rights of all girls and boys are
equally respected. Yet, notwithstanding the values, principles and rights so
widely endorsed by the international community, too often the reality is that
girls are systematically left behind by virtue of their sex. This must end.
Practices such as child labour and child marriage the theme of this Day are
a denial of the rights of children and an acute constraint to their full
development. Such practices also weigh heavily on the overall capacity of
societies to achieve their development objectives.
Some 88 million of the worlds child labourers are girls. Their specific
vulnerability is recognized in the ILO Worst Forms of Child Labour Convention -
http://www.ilo.org/dyn/normlex/en/f?p=1000:12100:0::NO::P12100_ILO_CODE:C182
Many girls enter the workforce at an early age, commonly ending up in the
lowest paid and insecure work, constrained by gender inequality at home and in
the workplace. Moreover many working in the home remain invisible and
unaccounted for. The patterns of inequality are also reflected in education
outcomes with 64 per cent of illiterate adults being women.
Inequality of access at the primary level becomes even more marked at the
secondary level. Yet education, starting with a quality basic education for
all, is the corollary to the effective abolition of child labour and a
fundamental step in opening up better prospects for decent work in adulthood
and in generating a new dynamic of change with social and economic progress.
The benefits of valuing and investing in the girl child for herself, her
family, community and society, have long been evident.
Improving the situation of the girl child on a sustainable basis calls for a
coherent set of measures geared towards changing structures, policies and
values that sustain social injustice. Measures targeting the girl child must be
accompanied by those that empower women and mothers through organization,
access to income-generating activities and social protection.
Today with persisting conditions of global economic crisis and uncertainty,
there must be a firm resolve to re-commit to the goals of social progress and
social justice in shaping a world where the girl child finds her rightful place
on equal terms with boys, at home and in school and well-prepared for entry,
at the right time, to the world of work.