Towards Eliminating Child Labour

MINISTER for Labour and Transport Management Palten Gurung has reiterated His Majesty’s Government’s commitment to eliminate all kinds of child labour within the next 10 years and the worst forms of child labour within the next five years. Addressing the 13th Asia Pacific Regional Meeting of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) in Bangkok, Thailand recently, he said that an outline to implement programmes for this had already been prepared. In the past decade, Nepal has been showing its seriousness in addressing the issue of child labour in the country. In 1997, Nepal signed the Amsterdam Declaration on Child Labour and the Oslo Declaration on Child Labour. And it has ratified the ILO Convention 138 on the minimum age for employment. And in June 1999, it adopted the Convention 182 on the worst forms of child labour. To put these conventions into practice, Nepal has enacted new laws. The Constitution of Nepal forbids the engagement of minors in a factory, mine or in a dangerous workplace. The Children’s Act prohibits the employment of children below 14 years in manufacturing industries. And in 2000, the Government introduced an Act that requires an employer to provide child workers with education, vocational training and medical treatment. The government is now working with the ILO to eradicate child labour in hazardous work by 2005. Despite all the seriousness shown, yet child labour in the country is widespread. It is not difficult to understand why preventing or controlling child labour is difficult. Poverty forces many children from an early age to work for their survival and contribute to the family income. A Nepal Labour Force Survey conducted two years ago found that more than 40 per cent of all children aged between 5 to 14 years work, that is there are more than 1.9 million children working in the country today. Most of the children are engaged in agricultural labour, although the most visible are the street children. What is particularly disturbing is that nearly half of all children who are not in school are working. Nepal has a tough task ahead, but this issue is something that needs to be taken by the horns if children are to have a better future. Coordinating activities among the government, international organisations such as the ILO and Unicef, non-governmental organisations and the community can make quite a difference in this endeavour in a relatively short period of time.

ID For Disabled

A TWO-day conference was organised in Lalitpur the other day in which participants including policy makers, experts and others working in the field of rights and welfare of disabled persons held extensive deliberation on the policies and programmes concerning the disabled people in the country. Inaugurating the conference officiating secretary at the Ministry of Women, Children and Social Welfare Krishna Prasad Bhandari said that His Majesty’s Government was committed to protect and promote the rights of the disabled.

The Secretary also informed that the government was contemplating on distributing identity cards to all disabled people living in every corner of the country in the current fiscal year. The decision of the government to distribute identity cards to disabled people is, indeed, a laudable work, as it would help identify the total number of disabled people and also contribute in effectively providing facilities to them based on the identity cards. Disabled persons are also equal citizens of the country and if provided due opportunities, they can also contribute for the development of the nation. Despite the constitutional provision of equality, many disabled persons are not treated equally and they are also not provided due opportunities and facilities for their development. This could be due to the lack of awareness in the society that disabled people too are humans just like other normal people. In this way disabled persons have had to suffer mental torture because of our existing social attitude. As a result, they have not been able to show their talent and ability. Against this background, a clear-cut policy and comprehensive programme for the welfare and development of the disabled people is very much needed. However, it is unfortunate that the country even does not have accurate and authentic statistics concerning the disabled people. As a result, it has been difficult to properly plan and carry out programmes and activities for the welfare and development of the physically handicapped. There are different types of physically disabled people in the country and different types of programmes need to be carried out for the development of these unfortunate fellow countrymen. Realising this need, the government has constituted the disabled services national coordination committee to chalk out and implement programme for the welfare and development of disabled citizens. Almost 90 per cent of disabled people live in the rural areas and such programmes have hardly benefited such people living in the countryside. Thus, it is necessary to design programmes to benefit the disabled people living in the villages, which also would bring the physically handicapped population into the mainstream of all national activities.