Extent of Child Labor in Nepal

-Dr. Hridaya R. Bajracharya, Executive Director, CERID, T.U

As the agriculture sector in Nepal mainly comprises highly labor-intensive subsistence farming, a substantial number of children are drawn into active socio-economic work. Children of more disadvantaged, such as the peasants of the mountains, and "low-caste" people or politically marginalised and minority ethnic groups in the hills and Terai are predestined to engage in hard labor before they have a chance to grow up and mature in a normal way. Such communities do not have land to support themselves for the whole year nor do they have access to other forms of income.

Although there is a lack of information regarding the extent of the child labor or the nature of the work the children are involved in, the 1991 census, CBS, 1991, indicates that 5.3 hundred thousand, 23% of the children between 10-14 years are involved in work. The proportion of working girls of this age group is higher, 28 %.

Obviously, the actual numbers of working children would be much higher, for the data do not take into account the children below ten years. The actual working conditions of the children, their problems and the in-depth understanding of the situation are still unknown. Also lacking is an understanding of the problem created by ever-persistent population expansion. The population expansion rate in Nepal has remained 2.6% for several decades.

As mentioned above, the major work involvement of children is in the agriculture sector, 89.3%, mostly family farming. Domestic servants, shop assistants, porters, etc. also constitute the bulk of remaining categories. Only 2.4% are in the Industrial sector, ILO, 1995. The following is a description of the work areas where child labor is involved:

# Agriculture: Fodder and firewood collection, tending livestock, plantations and harvesting, etc.

# Domestic work and Cottage Industry: Fetching water, helping in cooking and cleaning. Helping in the family occupations, such as basket making, pottery, sewing, Ironsmith and weaving for home utilities:

# Trade and Service: Domestic servants, hotel and restaurant boys, tempo/bus conductors, porters, shop assistants, working at petrol pumps, rag-picking, street vending, show shine boys:

# Manufacturing/Industry: Working in carpet factory, brick kilns, leather factory, match factory, confectionery, candle and soap making, plastic factory, beedi making, and in small scale textiles and garment works:

# Construction: Working in construction site and road building;

# Other more serious exploitative forms: Prostitution, street children, trafficked children.

Child labor in domestic service, in restaurants and in various work places including construction work involves unidentified work, which are some times very tedious and hazardous. Children of hired farm workers, bonded laborers and the marginalised communities working as domestic servants, are implicitly or explicitly bonded to their employers due to the bonded status of their parents. Children are also bonded due to the debts that their parents could not pay. But there are also sections of people who employ helpless children as domestic servants providing them with the so-called umbrella of protection. This is often taken as benevolent act equivalent to guardianship. Critics point out that children are employed mainly because they are obedient, non-interfering and easy to handle.

Small industry such as Carpet industry, Brick kiln, Confectionery, and Tobacco factory are reported to employ child labor. Intensity of child labor, which involves monotonous drudgery in a drab work environment, exists in these sectors. These sectors are also noted for other undue exploitations of child laborers, such as low pay, confinements for long hours, etc. Girls are socially more disadvantaged than boys and are more vulnerable to physical as well as psychological abuse. Cases of sexual exploitation of a girl child often go unreported. Such circumstances have forced many girl children into prostitution and trafficking.

An increasing number of homeless children in the streets and involvement of girl children in prostitution have become major problems of urban development in Nepal. Such street children mostly run away from their home in the rural villages into urban areas because of the horrible family environment, or of stark poverty so that they do not even get to have enough food, or of sheer adventurism. Children such as those born to parents who are bonded laborers and those abandoned or orphaned are also pushed into hazardous work situations or on to the streets. In the case of such runaway children, girls are easily induced to prostitution as they get deceived by traffickers and brothel operators. Some children work on servitude for easy money.

One more issue is the way many of these children are predestined to work as laborers because of the discriminatory types of social structure characterized by caste, bonded labor, child marriage and considering girls as the subservient sex. A more alarming aspect of the problem is its nature of persistence.

In brief, these problems of child labor in Nepal pertain to the dilemma of ever-present poverty all over the country in general, and in particular in the rural areas where a majority of people have to live on subsistence farming, supplemented by seasonal migration to cities for manual jobs. Exploitative social situation in the villages further aggravates the problem. The visible consequence of this is that there are now estimated 5,000 street children. 40,000 Children in debt bondage and nearly 25,000 child prostitutes, not counting those who are regularly being trafficked into India for the same purpose.

Legislation and Law Enforcement: The concern of children at work has been reflected in the Constitution of Nepal since 1950. The latest Constitution 1990 prohibits employment of minors as laborers in factories, mines and in any hazardous work. HMG/N also enacted Labor Act-1991 and the Children’s Act-1992 which make the employment of the children below the age of 14 years a penal offence. The other legislation concerning child-related issues are the Civil Law Code-1963, the Foreign Employment Act-1985 and the Human Trafficking (control) Act-1986.

Although acts and the laws are made, the law enforcement mechanism is far from being effective and also the penalties prescribed are mild and do not act as a deterrent. For example, Labor Act is limited to registered enterprises employing 10 people or more, unless these are located in the Industrial District, whereas there are numerous factories which are unregistered or do not list the working minors as workers. Moreover, the Act does not include agriculture except tea estates. Also not included is the entire informal sector, which constitutes a sizeable part of economy. Similarly, the Constitution prohibits bonded labor, however, no law exists for the remission of the debt or punishing those who contravene the constitutional provision. The machinery of Labor Administration is short of staff and is unable to cope with the problems. The District Child Welfare Board prescribed by the Children Act-1991 has yet to function as effective unit.

Commitments Made and Initiatives Taken:

Commitments: The problems of child labor and child exploitation have been one of the humanitarian concerns all over the world. International, regional, and sub-regional conventions and resolutions have emphasized the need for eliminating all forms of child labor and child exploitations. Nepal has been represented in many of these major events and has shown its commitments by becoming signatory to these conventions and resolutions. The following is a brief description of such commitments made:

# Nepal is a signatory to the UN Convention on the rights of child. 1989, and ratified in 1990.

# HMG/N signed the Colombo resolution of the SAARC. The SAARC summit resolution clearly lays emphasis on the commitment of the head of states on the need for addressing the child labor problems, taking urgent actions to alleviate the situation of Girl Children in Especially Difficult Circumstances.

# In February 1995, HMG/N and the ILO Memorandum of Understanding extending the ILOs International Program on the Elimination of Child Labor, IPEC, to Nepal A national steering committee was formed by the Ministry of Labor in May 1995 in accordance with the memorandum of understanding. The Committee has recommended a number of Action Program proposals reflecting a variety of concerns including bonded child labor in agriculture and working children belongi8ng to depressed castes. A national tripartite workshop held jointly by the ministry of Labor and the ILO resolved that certain basis human rights conventions including the Minimum Age Convention, 1973 be ratified by Nepal. The convention was ratified in 1997.

# Nepal is also signatory to several UN conventions that outline Child rights and emphasize the elimination of exploitation of children e.g.:

# Convention on the rights of the child: Convention for the suppression of the trafficking in person and of the exploitation of the girls with the intention of employing them for prostitution; # The supplementary convention on the abolition of slavery, slave trade and institutions and practices similar to slavery, 1956.

Initiatives: In pursuance of international commitment at various levels—world, regional and sub-regional level, HMG/N has taken several policy initiatives to address the problem. The Eighth Five Year Plan of HMG/N emphasizes development of programs for the benefit of children in difficult circumstances, abandoned, orphaned, and street children as well as children affected by drug abuse. The government policy in this regard is to encourage and provide facilities to NGOs and INGOs involved in such programs. For this, a National Welfare Council for Children and Women if formed under the National Planning Commission. The following are the major policy measures in this regard:

# Mobilizing people through campaigns to create awareness about the need to eradicate the problems of the issues of child labor including child trafficking and their sexual exploitation;

# Developing programs for rescue and rehabilitation of the victims of child labor from hazardous/exploitative cases such as sexual exploitation and developing mechanism for ensuring compensations to the victims;

# Developing preventive programs through poverty alleviation schemes by creating jobs and self-employment schemes in the affected areas. Marketable skill-oriented formal and vocational education development will be emphasized for this;

# Forming a coordinating body at the central level as well as at the district and village levels, as necessary;

# Developing information system by mobilizing district level coordination committees;

# Coordinating with international, national and local level organizations.

Implementation of the policies into practice is rather a difficult task in Nepal for several reasons:

# Lack of skilled human resource as well as lack of fund to support consistent and effective implementation of the policies;

# Lack of clarity regarding what is desirable and what programs can be realistic also contribute to the problems of policy implementation;

# Developing an effective mechanism and a process of policy implementation is a difficult task because of the adverse contexts created by the traditional social system structure and process where trust and commitments are yet to become part of work ethics. So far, inter-personal relation and obligations play major roles in the system, process and structure. This problem is perpetuated by the continuation of feudalistic mentality among the people who hold key positions in the society as well as in the political leadership.

Text courtesy: Excerpts from the article of the author on "Child Labor in Informal Sector" from the book, Status of Informal Sector Workers: The Other Side of Economy of Nepal, edited by Dr. H. B. Jha, jointly published by CETS and FES, Nepal -Editor.

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