Improving the Enforcement of Child Labor Laws in Five Countries

Jun 10, 2019 | Africa, Asia, Child Labor, South America

 

The International Labor Organization (ILO) estimates that 152 million children worldwide are engaged in child labor. For the past four years, Verité partnered with Winrock International and Lawyers Without Borders to address this problem by providing technical assistance to governments in five countries: Burkina Faso, Liberia, Nepal, Belize, and Panama. The CLEAR II project (Country Level Engagement and Assistance to Reduce Child Labor), funded by the US Department of Labor, had three goals: to improve governments’ response to child labor, decrease the number of children exploited, and increase awareness of child labor in the private sector.

 

As part of the project, Verité worked with the Ministries of Labor in each country to create tools and training programs that would strengthen enforcement of child labor laws and lead to a meaningful reduction in the worst forms of child labor. The work included promoting better coordination and collaboration among labor inspectors and other stakeholders, such as prosecutors and police; developing an organizational improvement toolkit for inspectorate management; and development of a curriculum on child labor that was tailored to each country. Now completed, the curriculum consists of a facilitator’s guide and lessons and exercises that cover the topics of strategic planning, child interview techniques, coordination and collaboration between stakeholders, media strategies, planning for rescues, and more.

 

Upon finalization of the curriculum in each country, select inspectors were chosen to take part in a series of training of trainers (ToT) workshops. The goal of the ToTs was to develop internal expertise on child labor within the Ministries of Labor and position them as experts so that they, in turn, would be able to train their staff and others supporting the work.

 

Since the ToTs, the Ministries have trained groups ranging from labor inspectors to immigration personnel to private business representatives:

  • In Nepal, inspectors have used the curriculum to train social mobilizers and other municipal employees responsible for child protection.
  • In Burkina Faso, the Ministry of Labor facilitated two trainings for inspectors outside the capital who had not attended the ToT, and two trainings for employees at other government agencies who work on child labor issues.
  • In Panama, Liberia, and Belize, ToT participants have co-facilitated trainings on child labor for members of the Chamber of Commerce and other employer groups.

With the new tools and a cadre of professionals trained to share knowledge on best practices, these countries are now better prepared to tackle the issue of child labor.

 

To view curricula by country and language, select a curriculum below:

 

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