Increasing number of children working

The effects of the 2002 food crisis in Malawi continue to take a heavy toll of the country's children, the International Labour Organisation (ILO) said in a new report. The 50-page study, launched last week, noted an increase in the number of children forced to seek informal employment to cope with the aftershock of food shortages two years ago, when consecutive poor harvests placed over three million people in need of emergency food aid. The report, 'Hunger, Public Policy and Child Labour: A Case Study of Malawi,' noted a rise in the number of children doing "ganyu" (piecework) on the land as a way of earning money to buy food or support their families. According to the statistics, 11 percent of children between 10 and 11 years old were informally employed, while an estimated 42 percent of young people between 15 and 19 years of age participated in the labour market. In Kasungu and Mchinji districts in Central province, where a large number of children were working as labourers on tobacco estates, researchers found a significant number of them had been forced into employment due to the lack of educational facilities. "Children are very reluctant to travel over long distances to attend school, and this tends to encourage school-going children to drop out of school and seek employment. In addition to long distances to schools, the lack of textbooks, pens and uniforms might force children to abandon school temporarily and do 'ganyu' in order to realise some money, which they use to purchase these items," the report explained. The increasing rate of mortality due to AIDS-related illnesses among adults also meant that children had to find work to supplement family income - an estimated 780,000 people in Malawi are living with the virus. The ILO said it was concerned about the rise in the number of children who complained of maltreatment by employers, and the report highlighted that children were often regarded by employers as "obedient" and "easy to control" compared to adult labourers. The Geneva-based organisation warned that unless the government enforced existing laws to regulate the employment of minors, many children would continue to be abused by their employers.