Pakistan’s first provincial child labour unit set up

The Provincial Child Labour Unit (PCLU), Sindh, was inaugurated on Thursday at the Sindh Secretariat by Labour Minister Ameer Nawab Khan. The PCLU that has been established in collaboration with the European Commission and the International Labour Organisation (ILO), and aims to eradicate child labour from Sindh, the minister said, adding that child labour was a major hurdle in the economic and social development of the country.

The newly-inaugurated unit is the first amongst five child labour units that are soon to be set up in other provinces as part of the federal government’s programme for the elimination of child labour.

Children in the third world countries and even in the developed countries are engaged in labour that “takes away their childhood,” Khan said. “At a stage when they should be attending school and spending time in recreational activities, these children are made to work hard in factories, streets and houses,” he said.

Considering the global scenario, the ILO has made various conventions and Pakistan has ratified many of them, the minister said. According to Convention 138 of the ILO, the minimum age for labour is 15 years, and 18 years for jobs that include any danger. However, even though Pakistan has ratified this convention, but as per the lenience given to developing countries, children who are at least 14 years of age can be engaged in work that does not include any risk or danger.

Khan said that Articles 11 and 13 of the Constitution of Pakistan do not allow children and women to be engaged in difficult forms of labour. Moreover, the Factories Act 1934, Shops and Establishment Ordinance 1969 and the Employment of Children Act (ECA) 1991 protect children’s rights while guarantying the prevention of child labour.

Referring to a major aspect of the ECA 1991, which allows the citizens to complain against any violation of the act, the labour minister said that citizens, as major stakeholders in society, should also help the government in its efforts against child labour.

Earlier, ILO Chief Technical Advisor Sujeewa Fonseka congratulated the Sindh government on launching the PCLU for the first time in Pakistan. While pointing out that the issue of child labour was interlinked with poverty and education, he recommended that the government ensure two things as part of its poverty eradication programme: sufficient income for families, and education instead of work for children. Moreover he laid stress on the implementation of ECA 1991 that clearly prevents child labour.

Thardeep Rural Development Program Senior Strategic Manager Shahbano Aliani shared the findings of a survey on child labour that had been carried out in 2007 in districts Tharparkar, Umarkot, Jamshoro and Dadu.

“Sixty per cent of the families in these districts live below the poverty line and almost the same percentage were under debts at that time,” she said, while pointing out that parents could not afford to send their children to school and utilised them for earning livelihood instead.

She ensured full cooperation of the TRDP in the government’s initiative and said that her team will be able to identify setbacks in the eradication of child labour in these districts while it would also lend a hand to the government in capacity building and community sensitisation.