CHAPTER TWO
LITERATURE REVIEW
Concept of Child Labour
Who, in the eyes of the law, is a child? Under the Basic Remuneration Act 1961 , the age of maturity is eighteen (18) years. The employment of children Act 1938 said that anyone under fifteen (15) years is a child. However, the Child Act 1974 laid down sixteen (16) years as the age of maturity. Children are internationally categorized to be human beings below the age of eighteen (18) years. They are special link between the present and future generations. This fact about children could be one of the major reasons, which motivated the General Assembly of the United Nations (UN) at its convention on the 20th of November, 1989 to identify and adopt the children’s rights. The rights were ratified by a world submit on Children’s Rights by UNICEF in 1990. The right of the child has fifty four (54) articles. Aina and Zechum (1991) defined a child as a person who is physically, mentally, socially underdeveloped within the age period from birth to eighteen (18) years old. Odusanya (2002) defined a child as someone who is under fourteen (14) years of age that is time of care, protection and learning. During this period, there are many issues that the child cannot deal with “the parents and society are expected to take responsibility for whatever a child does during this period and determine the kind of adult he/she will become. Children are special and they hold the key to the future of any nation. The editorial of punch Tuesday 27th may2003 noted that, the greatness of any nation depends on how it took care of the children”. They should therefore be committed to the building of a nation for their children. There should be more concrete programmes and welfare and safety of vision children, to aid their growth to full physical and intellectual potentials in a technology driven world . Labour was defined by Hornby and wakefield (1974) as bodily or mental work. Thus, labour in the context of the research is work of any form, for productive ends. The Standard Dictionary (1978) defined labour as a physical or mental exertion, particularly for some useful or desired end. Schultz (1960) emphasized the importance of foregone earnings in human capital accumulation . Investors (parents, children) weigh the return on additional education investments against the cost; such investments entail the foregone economic contribution of children. Becker (1965) extended the argument to emphasize that non-wage uses of time, were apt to be an equally important influence on the opportunity cost of the child time in school. Rosenzweigh and Evenson (1977) appeared to be the first published study explicitly to analyse child labour in a developing country context. Child labour has received considerable attention in economics throughout the disciplines history . Early writing tended to focus on child labour solely through the lens of labour demand. Adam Smith (1980) emphasized the value of children labour shortage societies as motives for fertility. Friedrich Engels (1982) wrote extensively on the conditions of working children in the early industrial revolution. Bark (1989) stated that, quite a number of children preferred taking petty jobs to going to school . Even those who were sent to schools were usually not performing well in academic work. Child labour, according to Kissekka (1989), refers to the participation of children in productive labour on a more or less full time basis. Grant (1990) observed that more than one hundred (100) million children, including at least sixty (60) million girls had no access to primary schooling . It was felt that functional literacy was in all countries and that complete basic education programme was necessary for all and sundry. Grant (1991) similarly stated that most of the children found in rural areas were usually town rovers. Most of them were deprived of health and education, and almost all of them were victims of crime, prostitution and drug abuse . Scar (1993) took a constructivist factors, arguing that children constructed their realities from many possible realities that are latest in their environment. Erickson (1994) viewed the child who proposed the “eight (8) stages of development” stressed the importance of middle childhood as a time when children moved from home into wider social contexts, which strongly influenced their development. International Labour Organization (ILO, 1995) stated that the most recent data indicated that about twenty six percent (26%) of children aged ten to fourteen (10-14) years in Nigeria were engaged in economic activities. Hence, the magnitude of children’s labour force participation in Nigeria served as a compelling reason to investigate the consequences of child labour for children’s social and human capital development. Ankam (1995) defined child labour as any physical engagement of child either paid or unpaid directed at alleviating adult burden outside or inside the home to make a living. The International Labour Organization (ILO) defined the term as engagement of children below fifteen (15) years of age on work or employment on a regular basis with the aim of earning a livelihood for themselves or their families. According to Gill (1994) and Verma (1999), other studies noted that child labourers tended to engage in delinquent behaviors. Weiner (1991), Hassan and Dehnath (2000) stated that socially, children in industries were found to experience negative consequences in their educational development and performance. The prevalence of illiteracy, low school attendance and low enrolment has been attributed to children‟s economic participation. According to Lopez-Calva (2001), Bass (2004), the global phenomenon of child labour can be attributed to several factors. The rapid population growth of many less developed countries, high rates of unemployment, inflation and low wages have contributed to occurrence and necessity for children to engage in economic activity. The negative aspect of child labour were first spotlighted during industrialization in Great Britain when cheap child labourers in exploitative factory working condition became apparent and it is during this period when the term “child labour” was first coined (Cunningham & Viazzo, 1996; Zelier, 1985; UNICEF, 2005). The International Labour Organization (ILO, 2006) stated that (191) million children aged (5-14) years of age were engaged in economic activities throughout the world in 2004 . More than one third of these children Seventy four point four (74.4) million were considered to be involved in employments which were hazardous to their physical and mental health.
Forms of Child Labour Child labour is often defined as work that deprives children of their childhood, their potential and dignity, and that is harmful to physical and mental development. Work that interferes with the child schooling by: depriving them of the opportunity to attend school, obliging them to leave school prematurely or requiring them to attempt to combine school attendance with excessively long and heavy work can be referred to as “child labour”. Whether or not particular forms of “work” can be called “child labour” depends on the child’s age , the type and hours of work performed, the conditions under which the work is performed and the objectives pursued by individuals. The answer varies from country to country, as well as among sectors within countries. Child labour is common in the rural areas of developing countries . Usually there are no age requirements for schooling or for work. There are many reasons that these children work; Poverty, lack of education, lack of knowledge of one‟s rights and cultural tradition are all contributing factors. The United Nation‟s Children Fund (UNICEF, 1996) divided the profile of child labour in Nigeria into three categories: 1. Children working in public places such as streets and markets. A. Streets vendors in mobile and stationary position -64% B. Young beggars, who work alone or with parents/relatives –13.3% C. Shoe repairers (cobblers), boys 3.9% D. Car washers - 5.9% E. Young scavengers who worked alone or with their families –5.2% F. Head loaders/feet washers in markets 7.5% 2. Children working in semi-public settings namely cottage industries and mechanical workshops A. Apprentice mechanic and vulcanized – 23.9% B. Bus conductors – 16.5% C. Iron and metal workers – 5.6% D. Carpentry – 13.6%
E. Tailors and weavers – 14.4% F. Domestic and barbers – 18.1% 3. Domestic servants in private households
They constitute domestic workers in household of elite and sub-elite families who worked in the middle and upper echelons of bureaucracy private areas. Child labour problem is closely linked to the continents poverty, and can only be eliminated with increase in family income and children‟s educational opportunities. UNICEF, ILO and other organizations focused initially on the “Worst Forms” of child labour. Although agencies such as International Labour Organization (ILO), World Bank (WB) and UNICEF working on child labour issues originally had different concepts on child labour, following the establishment of worst Form of Labour Convention 182 in 1999 as well as Inter-Agency Research Cooperation such as understanding children‟s work in 2000, a growing consensus has emerged that child labour refers to unacceptable forms of child work. The meanings and implications of child labour have been highly dependent on its social strategies and objectives of each working organization (Post and Sakurai, 2001; Post 2001a). According to Heady (2000) who conducted a research on effects of child labour on learning achievement, observed almost all children in Ghana claim to do some housework, and so the analysis of participation in housework would not be revealing. Harsh (2001) identified the followings as the different types of child labour: forced labour and slavery, prostitution, trafficking, employment in the drug trade and other criminal activities, begging and occupations that are especially dangerous to children‟s health and security. According to International Labour Organizations (ILO) official data, an estimated two hundred and eighteen (218) million children were counted as child labourers as of 2004 (Hagemann,Diallo, Etienne, Mehran, 2006). Just as the problems of child labour have been around long enough to attract attention, so has the term “child labour”. Although following the ILO convention No. 182 of Worst Forms of Child labour, the term child labour was generally interpreted as “all cases in which children were exposed to harm at work, whether or not children are less than fourteen (14) years old or less” (UNICEF, 2005). According to “Understanding Children‟s Work (UCW) keynote (2003 and UNICEF (2005) which cited ILO‟s definitions on child labour, the current official definitions of child labour among ILO, UNICEF, WB, and other organizations are as follows :
- Child work or children‟s work is a general term covering the entire spectrum of work and related tasks performed by children. 2. Child labour refers to a subset of children‟s work that is injurious to children and that should be targeted for elimination. 3. Hazardous work refers to - Physical, psychological or sexual abuse; - Work that is underground, underwater, at dangerous heights in confined spaces - Work with dangerous machinery, equipment and tools, or which involves the manual handling or transport heavy load
- Work in our unhealthy environment which would expose children to hazardous substance, agents or processes to temperatures, noise levels, or vibrations which might damage their health. 4. Child Trafficking Child trafficking includes recruitment, transportation or receipt of a child for the purposes of sexual or labour exploitation, forced labour or slavery. Trafficking in children is a human right tragedy estimated to involve over a million children worldwide Child trafficking is only one of the more pernicious aspects of a much broader problem. Africa is said to have the highest incidence of child labour in the world (www.google.com/child trafficking(1998) . Trafficking is conceived to be a new form of slave trade and has grown in security and magnitude in recent years particularly in southern Nigeria. According to International Labour Organization (ILO), (1998) forty one percent ( 41%) of all African children between the ages of five (5) and twelve (12) were involved in some form of economic activity, compared with twenty one percent (21%) in Asia and seventeen percent (17%) in Latin America among girls, the participation rate also was the highest, thirty seven percent (37%) in Africa, twenty percent (20%) in Asia and eleven percent (11%) in Latin America. Alabor (2000) stated that of the thirty six (36) states of Nigeria, Edo state has a highest prevalence rate of eighty five percent (85%) of women and girls trafficked to other countries. Other states include Delta, Akwa Ibom, Ondo, Rivers, Ebonyi, Imo, Enugu, Lagos and Kano State, while women from Northern states of Nigeria were often trafficked to Saudi Arabia. It is no coincidence that Africa also is the poorest region, with the weakest school systems and is more likely to seek work. 5. Hawking, Hawking entails carrying ware’s about for sale. It may involve the hawker offering the goods from door to door. Of the categories of child labour in the United Nation’s Children Fund (UNICEF) profile, hawkers have received the most controversial attention. They constitute a majority of sixty four point three percent (64.3%) of children working in public places. The young traders are seen throughout the day and everyday of the week except on Sundays (some of them), in which activities are much reduce. Ebigbo (1993) rightly observed, the streets in the streets in the major city centers of Nigeria were filled with children hawking, he further maintained that this was not a good way of preparing a child for future employment. 6. Street Children: Street children are those who live on the streets and who work to support their street existence. They carryout work such as head loading (Dako) and scavenging to sustain themselves. Some are exploited by older youths and men to carry out domestic and economic tasks in return for food and other essentials for survival. In Bicksteth Oloko (1979), it was found that most apprentices stopped schooling before or after primary six. Further study showed relatively low academic performance for those still in schools. This is associated with “intendancy or poor motivation”. Dyorough (1984) cited in Mohammed (1995) that in bus conducting the ratio of child to adult bus conductor is one to six (1-6) in major cities. 7. Child Begging: Another form of child labour that many Nigerians might not have noticed is child begging. This has become a kind of profession where children are tactically involved and exploited. This form of labour has many faces. In some cases children who are well and fit to be in school, but for some reasons are taken to the streets to beg. Some serve as beggar guides and are normally settled by their employers who are either old people or blind adults. According to Journal of women in Colleges of Education North East Zone (JOWICE) (2002) some were hired out by their parents to do this job, while some actually arranged with physically handicapped children as a form of business where the healthy ones carry them on their backs or on a wheel chair. At the end of the day, they share the earnings according to their agreement.
Causes of Child Labour Childhood is the most innocent stage in a human life. It is that phase of life where a child is free from all the tensions, fun-loving, play, and learns new things, and is the sweetheart of all the family members. But this is only one side of the story. The other side is full of tensions and burdens. Here, the innocent child is not the sweetheart of the family members, instead he/she is an earning machine working the entire day in order to satisfy the needs and wants of his/her family according to Garwal (2001). This is what is called “Child Labour”. Child labour includes working children who are below a certain minimum age. Child labour causes damage to a child’s physical and mental health and also keep him deprived of his basic rights to educations, development, and freedom. According to statistics provided by UNICEF, there were an estimated one hundred and fifty eight (158) million children aged five (5) to fourteen (14) years in child labour worldwide in the year 2006, and this figure is continuously increasing (2011). The problems of child labour is a major concern of our time. It is a complex issue with no simple solution. Enormous is scale destructive to society and fatal in it's consequences. These are many reason why children are driven into hazardous and debilitating labour .The least may not be exhausted, but a reasonable number of factors would be considered.
The following have been identified as the causes of child labour in Nigeria and Abeokuta south area of Ogun state.
(A) exploitation of poverty:
(B) lack of educational facilities
(C) societal class discrimination
(D) population explosion
Exploitation of poverty seems to be the most powerful cause of children taking up jobs at a tender age which are hazardous , Awake (1999 ) state that “ For poor families ,the small contribution child’s income or assistance at home that allows parents to work can make the difference between and a bare sufficiency “ .
Adebisi ( 1993 ) emphasized that poverty is the major cause of child labour . “ When the head of a family is hard up that he could not meet material needs of the family he might be tempted to make his children however small work his money “ . He continued by saying that “ a child who is an orphan or a progeny of broken marriage may be forced to look for a job if he does not want to take to the street .
The education system in Nigeria has gone down so much especially at secondary school level . This is because classrooms , seats , black boards ,textbooks are usually non existence and where they exist are inadequate ( Ezema 2001 ,Oram 1990 ) children in such schools lose interest in education and may make up being engaged in child labour .
The Nigerian society does not provide equal opportunities for all classes of her citizens . In fact little efforts are being made to close the gap between the rich and the poor in society where choice jobs are provided on the basis of who you are and whom you know .This situation enables only the elites of the society to grab the highly lucrative and paying jobs where as the less paying jobs are left for the disadvantages and the poor .
This ensures that families under the later group are perpetually confined to eternal struggle for survival and are pushed to put their children through child labour to sustain the family ( Amadi 1998 ,Olawale and Solola 1999 )
Ignorance leading to uncontrolled birth which consequently lead to having many children also contribute to child labour inability of parents to provide the basis offspring from broken homes will engage in one work or the other no matter how dangerous in order to make meet .
According to Adenuga Alabi (2000 ) poverty is one major cause of child labour poverty may mean the state of being very poor or the state of being lacking in quality or amount . Most of the parents that engage their children in one labour or the other are very poor , they only manage to send this children to primary school , those parents who manage to send their children to secondary education ,could not sparse them to higher level. Poverty a times may be inform of money or in quality some parents do not believe in education , they see it as a waste in sending children to school instead they should be into labour or apprentiship . The labour in which they involve their children deny them of access to education since they have to work for long hours .But unfortunately most of these children are not properly fed , nor can they attend school , a denial of their basic rights which spells doom for their future .
The major cause of child labour in Abeokuta South is environment .The type of environment in which children are brought can dictate its level of development. Children who are brought up in such areas can be denied access to education. Many of them at young age , they would be exposed to trade work ,by that time the children who have been handled a small amount of money , would not have mind of going to school like the other children who are not exposed to child labour .
Effects of Child Labour
Childhood is perhaps the most blessed stage in a human life. It is that phase of life where, children are not really aware of any form of worldly responsibilities, they are free from all the tensions and they can learn a whole lot of new things. No wonder, people keep having this wistful desire of going back to their childhood and relive all those beautiful memories. But there is other side to this phase and in that, many children are forced to work in inhumane conditions. This phase is also known by “child labour” where a child is full of tensions and burdens and he has to perform the tough job of being primary earning member of the family. Such children lose their innocence to satisfy the needs and wants of their family. The problem of child labour is huge and is faced by many countries in the world.
Child labour is not a recent phenomenon. Throughout human history, children have been made to work under hazardous and unhealthy conditions. In other words, child exploitation has remained an integral part of our culture and despite the advances made by us in last few centuries; we haven’t been able to eradicate this menace. Children are made to work in factories, mining, agriculture, on streets and as domestic helps. Child labor is an attack on basic rights of the children. Leave alone lack of educational opportunities to them, most of these children are malnourished and treated like animals. Child labour practices causes damage to a child’s physical and mental health apart from depriving him of his basic rights to education, development, and freedom. Unfortunately, the number of underage children working in unfavorable working conditions has kept on increasing.
Nigeria has one of the largest populations of child labourers. These children work in unsafe environments where there is a constant danger of fatal accidents. Children employed as labourers spend most of their waking hours working. They are condemned to a life of poverty, illiteracy, and prolonged misery with no end in sight. They are required to perform grueling and physically demanding tasks and in return receive only meager wages. Poor working conditions cause severe health problems to such children. A child labour not just suffers physical and mental torture but also becomes mentally and emotionally mature too fast which is never a good sign.
As children are sensitive to influences of toxics, chemicals, noise, pollution, heat and accidents, as a result of which many children develop lifelong health complications in worst cases, even lose their lives. A large number of child labourers are employed in mining, manufacturing, transportation and construction sectors where chances of fatal injuries are quite high. Because of the environmental influence, underage children suffer from permanent psychological scars. They do not possess confidence or self esteem. It is hard to imagine, how we as a country are going to prosper when a significant population of the nation suffers from such huge problems. It is not just duty of the government to take appropriate measures to rectify the situation but it is also the responsibility of the Nigeria citizens to contribute their bit in getting rid of barbaric practice of child labour.
Education provides the situation that makes children to learn through experience brought about instruction.
Education is the weapon with which the mind is opened, ignorance is killed and opportunities of employment are increase which in effect makes the governance easy for the ruler as they will have lengthened souls as their subjects, little wonder why people refer to it as the best legacy or the most precious gift a government could give its citizens.
The national policy of education (1981) established that education is aimed at developing the whole man and enabling him to function effectively in whatever environment he finds himself to educate and individual is to empower him as the individual acquires more and better skills. The main aim of education is to make the child function acceptably in the society.
From the discussion so far, child labour does not provide the child with education opportunities for self development, it is rather a quick route towards object of poverty because it deprive the child the opportunity for acquisitions of skills and abilities that could help child develop the self improvement.
Adenuga (2001) illiteracy also contributes to child labour. This may be due to cuts in social spending by government which had devastating effects on education.
A united nation survey carried out in (1994) 14 of the world’s least developed countries revealed some interesting fact for example, in half of these country, classroom for the first grade have seat for only 4 out of every 10 pupils. Half of these have text books and half of the classroom has no chalkboards. Not surprisingly many children who attend such schools end up working. A great abuse of the youth education that is supposed to be right of every child has been impeded, thus becoming privileges for some selected.
Social-cultural values or class discrimination often encourage child labour. The Nigeria society does not provide equal opportunities for all classes of her citizens in fact little efforts are being made to close the gap between the rich and the poor in society where choice of job are provided on the basis of who you are and who you know. This situation enables only the elites of the society to grab the highly lucrative and paying jobs whereas the less paying jobs are left for the disadvantages and the poor, this ensures that families under the latter group are perpetually confined struggle for survival and are pushed to put their children through child labour to help sustain the family.
Child labour as a effect to education has negative impact on children’s development and welfare. In a study conducted by Nwanko (2001) into the abuse of house help, 95% agreed to not having enough rest and equally 95% agree to not being regular at school. Moreover, children who hawk are usually very aggressive and stubborn. This could be attributed to the treatment given to them by the people they daily meet at the motor parks and streets children who hawk face several dangers ranging from rape abuse by older boys and this rape can leads to pregnancy that can stop the child going to school. Oloko (1999) notes that people who engage children in labour do not have their interest at heart, irrespective of the weather condition, children are always seen doing what they know how to do best, some of the goods or wares these children hawk are dangerous to them like cigarettes, alcohol and drugs, all these exposed expose the children to one danger or the other. These children might copy certain habits that were hither to alien to them like drug abuse, death, unwanted pregnancies. There is also high risk of contacting HIV/AIDS because they might not even be aware of the existence of such diseases.
Apart for this, child labour such as hawking and begging exposes innocent children to corrupt social practices especially the girl child are particular vulnerable to rape, unwanted pregnancies, their health is also often compromised through exposure to danger, accidents and unsanitary physical condition at work.
Domestic work has also become more hazardous, partly because of the lower age at which some children get engage in domestic service. Although most are in their teens the few are as young as nine or ten. Another factors is the change in the way in which children get engage in servants. In the past, this was done mainly through direct contact between the child’s parents and employers, sometimes as a form of traditional fostering arrangement, whereby children would receive education or vocational training in returns for work in the household. However, this link with the child’s parents now sense of obligation have been eroded, as more or more children are procured from impoverished rural families by middlemen driven only by a commercial motive and transported long distances to work in urban household. In same cases it is the rural children themselves surveyed in the five cities in 1992 had left home without even informing their parents (Oloko 1992).
The degrading conditions in which some of these children are displayed and given art to complete strangers by those traffickers in akin to a form of slave trade.
In fact, the idea of imposing a husband on owns daughter is nothing but child labour. This is because the interest and consent of the child is neither sort nor considered. The case of Hauwa Abubakar reported in the Gaurdian of 23rd of March 1987 could be brought to memory lane, here Hauwa Abubakar was a give away marriage by her parents against her wish on March 4th 1987. The lady objected to this act but her so called husband chopped off her legs to prevent her from running away and she died as a result of that.
The following are futher effects of child labour :
(i) Poverty and Unemployment
Poverty is the primary cause of child labour. Poor parents send their children to work, not out of choice, but for reasons of economic expediency. Poor children and their families may rely upon child labour in order to improve their chance of attaining basic necessities. About one- fifth of the Worlds six billion (6,000, 000,000) people live in absolute poverty. The intensified poverty in parts of Africa, Asia and Latin America causes many children there to become child labourers, Bennett, Jodne and Sherer (2004).
(ii) Adult Unemployment and Urbanization
Adults often find it difficult to find jobs because factory owners find it more beneficial to employ children at cheap rates. Adult exploitation of children is also seen in many places. Elders relax at home and live on the labour of poor helpless children
(http://www.childlabour (2011).
(iii) Access to compulsory, free education is limited
Approximately one hundred and twenty five million children in the world do not attend school, limiting future opportunities for the children and their communities. The Global Campaign for Education estimates that free, quality education for all children would cost ten (10,000,000,000) billion dollars, the same as four (4) days of global military spending also irrelevant and non-attractive school curriculum. Bennett et al (2004).
(iv) Existing laws or codes of conduct are often violated. Even when laws or codes of conduct exist, they are often violated. For example, the manufacture and export of product often involves multiple layers of production and out sourcing of production and out sourcing, which can make it difficult to monitor who is performing labour at each step of the process. Extensive subcontracting can intentionally or unintentionally hide the use of child labour
(v) Laws and enforcement are often inadequate
Child labour laws around the world are often not enforced or include exemptions that allow for child labour to persist in certain sectors, such as agriculture or domestic work. Even in countries where strong child labour laws exist, labour departments and labour inspection offices are often underfunded and under-staffed, or courts may fail to enforce the laws. Similarly, many state governments allocate few resources to enforcing child labour law
(vi) Worker’s Rights are Repressed:
Worker‟s abilities to organize unions affect the international protection of core labour standards, including child labour. Attacks on worker‟s abilities to organize make it move difficult to improve labour standards and living standards in order to eliminate child labour. For example, in 2001, ten thousand Workers were fired and four thousand (4,000) workers were arrested as a result of their union activity according to the international confederation of Free Trade unions.
(vii) The global economy intensifies the effect of some factors.
As multinational corporations expand across borders, Countries compete for jobs, investment and industries. This competition sometimes slows child labour reform by encouraging corporations and governments to seek low labour costs by resisting international standards.
(viii) The effects of poverty and parental illiteracy in developing countries are often worsened by the large interest payments on development loans. The structural adjustments associated with these loans often require governments to cut education, health, and other public programs further harming children and increasing pressure on them to become child laborers. Bennett et al (2004).
Child Labour and Poverty Fos (1975) stated that it was alarming to know that about seventy one percent of Nigerian households were poor and hungry today and that the child was made to work to improve the family’s income thereby meeting the family’s basic needs. Mumaw (1996) defined poverty as thus, a condition of human existence where sources for meeting basic human needs are extremely limited or inaccessible. United Nations Development Programme (UNDP, 1997) universally accepted definition of poverty recognized three types of poverty namely: I. Absolute poverty means the inability to provide for physical substance to extent of being incapable of protecting human dignity. The substance may include food, clothing, shelter, potable water, health services, basic education, public transportation and work. People at this level have meager income and their marginal propensity to save is zero.
II. Relative poverty means that there is ability to satisfy basic needs III. Material poverty implies lack of ownership of physical assets such as land, animal and many others The World Bank (1996) also indicated that children of poor parents were vulnerable to child labour and mostly they do not attend school. The parents do not see education as increasing employment prospects for their children; rather some were kept out of school, especially the girls. They were taught to work and learn traditional skills that would enable them secure basic livelihood during adulthood and prepare them to be good housewives. Poverty is a global phenomenon threatening the survival of humanity. of the world‟s population two point eight ( 2.8) billion almost half lived on less than two dollar ($2) (N230) a day and one point two (1.2) billion lived on less than one dollar ($1) a day (World Bank, 2001). In sub-Saharan Africa including Nigeria, the number of poor people is increasing. It is now generally accepted that the dangers posed by poverty must be addressed and alleviated in the short run and eradicated in the long run. To this end, the United Nations (UN) declared 1996 as the International Year for the Eradication of Poverty. World leaders at the United Nations Millennium submit in New York September 2000, renewed international pledges to reduce absolute poverty by half, by the year 2015, a goal that has first set at the social summit in Copenhagen 1995 (Bage, 2001). In another report, Kvalsving (1988), sited in Adewale (2002) notes that poor school attendance was caused by the requirements parents place on children to be economically active which resulted in the children going to school late or having interruptions in their schooling because of seasonal agricultural activities. The effect of absenteeism on academic performance is that the pupils who are not attending school regularly are rather more exposed to conditions that favour further inability to attend school.
Psacharopolous (1997) observed the income earned by working Bolivarian children of age thirteen (13) amounted to thirteen percent (13%) of total household income average. Theoretically, there were many reasons why there might be a negative connection between family income and child labour. First, child labour may be bad in parental preferences so that as incomes improve, the family chooses to have children work less. Basu and Van (1998) stated that “Luxury axiom”, children only work when the family is unable to meet basic needs. Beyond subsistence, the luxury axiom posit, families always opt to keep children out of work. The luxury axiom is just a particular characterization of preferences. Second with diminishing marginal utility of income, the value of the marginal contribution of the child‟s income decreases. It should be noted that an important part of the child‟s economic contribution to the family might be through, not attending school if direct and indirect schooling cost is high. Third, higher family incomes may facilitate the purchase of substitute for child labour that lower the return of child labour within the home. The relationship between income and child labour illustrates that child “no work” is a luxury good that households “consume” when they can afford to do so, Basu and Van (1998). Basu and Van (1998) substantiate this commonly held theory with evidence that children of the non-poor seldom work, regardless of natural economic or political factors. Krueger (1996) furthermore observed that people with high socio-economic status tend to support government regulation of child labour. Economists use several models to explain the continued existence of child labour in a world that strongly prefers that children not participate in the workforce. Adewale (2000) also reported that absenteeism is associated with poor academic performance and the reverse is also the case. So withdrawing or keeping children at home for some reasons and later rejoining school seems to have adverse effects on children‟s learning. Dehejia and Gatti (2003) determine key explanatory variables for child labour by analyzing the type of bargaining that lead households to a particular outcome. The intra- household bargaining framework describes child labour as an outcome of bargaining between members of a household. In this framework, variables associated with family dynamics affect decisions about child labour. Such variables include wealth, family size, family member age, and gender of children. The extra- household bargaining framework, alternately, considers each household a single unit. Most economists agree that child participation in the workforce results from a household preference for immediate benefits of income rather than possible long term-benefits from human capital accumulation Dehejia and Gatti 2003 and Beegle 2006). Specifically, the literature suggests that families support child labour because they perceive that the benefits of work outweigh the benefits of school. Beegle (2004), however, note that school and labour are not perfect substitutes. Children may attend school and engage in work during the same period. Conversely, children may choose not to work or attend school. Nonetheless, most evidence suggests that children participate in either school or child labour. Moreover, those who work at a young age are unlikely to return to school in the future.
Child Labour and School Attendance Oghurbu (1999); Alio (2003) observed that social status and educational level of parent influence school attendance; they also emphasized influence school attendance. They claimed that geographical location of school, student‟s attitude towards school and subjects, inadequate supervision of student‟s activities by teachers and parents and poor teaching methods, lack of facilities affects students school attendance, students developed negative attitude towards school resulting into poor attendance because of non-employment of school leavers, repetition of class and insecurity according to Okewele (2003). Several recent studies have examined that possibility, Booze and Suri (2001) studied children aged seven to eighteen (7-18) year in Ghana in the late 1980, they concluded that an hour of child labour reduced school attendance by approximately zero point thirty eight (0.38) hours. Assaad (2003) observed that low attendance of Egyptian girls relative to boys appeared to be associated with a substantial domestic work burden of girls, because boys did not face the same work burden within the home. They faced fewer barriers to schooling such that in the Egyptian data, they did not observe a tradeoff between working and schooling attendance for boys. In developing countries, children are making significant economic contributions to their families through their labour market activities. Therefore, the opportunity cost of school attendance is expected to be substantial to the parents. This may mean that the return associated with time spent at school might not justify the loss of a child‟s economic contribution in a rural setting. In this case, parents may be reluctant to send a child to school (Khanam, and Ross, 2005). It is also argued that there is a trade-off between child labour (Current income) and accumulation of human capital through education. According to Khanam and Ross (2005) in rural Bangladesh putting a child in productive activities may increase current income but will seriously undermine his or her human capital development. Therefore, the failure of parents to internalize the trade-off between child labour and earnings ability will result in a high incidence of child labour. Khanam et al (2005) stated that on the other hand, child labour may impede school attendance and the quality of learning achievements of children. Okpupara and Chukwuone (2007) indentified that female headed households are more likely to have higher attendance in school, whereas educated fathers have strong impact increasing the probability of child school attendance than mothers. The study also revealed that school attendance of girls is significantly influenced by age whole; age is not significant for boys. School attendance register should be positively kept and utilized effectively for students records on attendance, because of the importance of attendance register in the control of discipline and promotion of academic achievement of students, Oghurbu (2006).
Child Labour and Academic Performance Child labour is often a complex issue sustained by employers‟ vested interest, class distinction and poverty, which has denied the child the opportunities to have basic education. According to Garrison (1965) “Reliability of young people to embrace the opportunities for employment will depend to a large extent upon the type of education and training they receive”. In Nigeria, education can hold the key towards successful livelihood, while lack of it can spell doom for the individual. If lower attendance is meaningful for human capital accumulation, it should translate into lower schooling attainment. Moreover, beyond attendance, work may undermine human capital accumulation by interfering with learning as evident in test scores or schooling completion rates. Lylhydal (1990) reported that working part time in high school actually raised grade point average (GPA) as long as student worked less than thirteen point five (13.5) hour per week. Barone (1993) found that younger students working long hours performed more poorly than did working older students. Some studies have found strong evidence of adverse consequences of child labour on academic performance. For instance, Singh (1998) reported that working long hours while in school did hurt standardized test scores and grades, although the effect was quite low. Stern (1997) found that working more than fifteen (15) hours per week while in school led to lower grades, less time spent on homework, increased likelihood of dropout and lower likelihood of entering school education. Psacharopoulous (1997) noted that children in wage work in Boliva completed their school a year earlier than working children and that working child in Venezuela have two (2) years less attainment It is difficult to imagine that passing in a poor quality school in a poor area might reflect a different knowledge level than passing in a very good school in a rich area. However, work is also correlated with worse performance in the measures of academic achievement Akabayashi and Psacharopoulous (1999) stated that working children spent less time studying which was reflected in both mathematics and reading test scores in their Tanzania data. However, it is possible that working children remain enrolled in school but do not attend as regularly Singh and Ozfurk (2000) explored the linkage between working hours and reported that an increase in hours of part-time work lowered the number of mathematics and science classes taken, which in turn led to lower performance in mathematics and science. The impact of working on learning while in high school or college in developed countries may be very much different than in developing countries. Heady (2000) observed that a child engaged in child labour activities faces exhaustion or a diversion of interest away from academic concerns. It may imply that it is not working that harms educational performance, but a lack of motivation that affects both work and learning. Singh and Oztuk (2000) explored the linkage between working hour and reported that an increase in hours of part time work lowered the number of mathematics and science classes taken, which in turn led to lower performance in mathematics and science. Sanchaz (2003) on the other hand using information on third (3rd) and fourth (4th) grades in Latin America found that in all ten (10) countries tested, performances on mathematics and language tests were lower when the child work outside the home, and impact became large when the child reported working many hour rather than few hours. Heady (2003), made use of a special living standard measurement survey in Ghana, that included information on test scores. It was found that child work had relatively little effect on school attendance, but had a substantial effect on learning performance in reading and mathematics. The effect remained strong even after controlling for the child‟s innate ability using Raven‟s test. Based on the fact that attendance was unaffected, the adverse consequence of child labour on student learning was attributed to exhaustion or lack of interest in academic performance rather than child time in school.
There is indirect evidence that child labour limits a child‟s human capital development. Child labour has been linked to greater grade retardation (Sedlacek, Guiherme, Suryea, Illah and Sasaki (2003), Rosatio and Rossi, 2001). Lower years of attained schooling (Psacharapaulos,1997) and lower returns to schooling leads to greater incidence of poverty as an adult (Illah, et al, 2003). On the other hand some studies have found that child labour and schooling may be complementary activities (Patrinos and Psacharapoulos, 1997). A definitive answer on whether child labour lowers cognitive attainment requires direct estimation of the educational production function. Menezes and Filho (2003) observed negative effect on age on school performance when they analyzed the cause of the decline in achievement scores that occurred between the Standard American Examination Board (SAEB) examinations administered 1995 and 2001 in Brazil. According to Edmond (2007) panel, data in child labour histories were rarely available, so studies typically compared current labour supply to current attainment. This is hard because current work status necessarily depends on past education and work histories, as these affect the value of child time and whether it‟s optimal for child to work.
Public Schools in Nigeria At the basic level of Education (Primary), the public schools are usually owned and operated by local government councils, while the states operate secondary schools. Universities and other institutions of higher learning are handled by both the federal and state governments. However, both the federal and state governments may also own model secondary schools where pupils who distinguish themselves at common entrance examinations are usually sent to receive special Education. There is also the unity schools and model colleges which were initially designed to accommodate gifted children, although over the years, this has not been respected by authorities. Equally federal government parastatal and agencies often times own and operate both primary and secondary schools. So for that reason, federal universities, military and paramilitary institutions such as the army, navy, Air-force and the police, Nigerian telecommunications company (NITEL), Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) among others have their own schools and colleges to cater for their employees.
Programmes Against Child Labour
The Nigerian Government has formally adopted three International Labour Organization (ILO) conventions setting a minimum age for the employment of children at sea, in industry and underground. In addition, the country signed a Memorandum of Understanding in August 2003 in cooperation with ILO to launch a country programme under the International Programme for the Elimination of Child Labour (IPEC). The Government showed further commitment by implementing the West Africa Cocoa Agriculture Project (WACAP) and by passing the Child Rights Act Sections 28 and 29 into law. The Child Rights Act prohibits exploitative Labour and enforces sections 58 -64 of the Labour Decree of 1974, now the Labour Act. All legislation is designed to protecting children from exploitative work. Some states, like Anambra State, have also banned children from working during school hours. While substantial legislation is now in place, legal enforcement remains another challenge to be met. UNICEF supported interventions UNICEF Nigeria undertakes a mix of activities to raise awareness and combat child labour across the country, including:
- Advocating for the ratification and enforcement of international laws that protect children.
- Supporting the passage of the Child Rights Act at the State level.
- Supporting an inter-agency approach especially with ILO-IPEC on child Labour.
- Supporting a National Baseline Survey with government partners and ILO, which will include data on sexual exploitation, child violence ad youth militia.
- Supporting the Federal Office of Statistics (FOS) to develop child protection indicators and assessment tools which will assist with the monitoring of child labour and other child protection issues in Nigeria.
- Signing a memorandum of understanding with the University of Lagos for the establishment of a University Chair to oversee the compilation of relevant peer reviewed child protection research including child Labour.
- Supporting African Network for the Protection against Prevention of all Forms of Child Abuse, Nigerian Chapter (ANPPCAN) to establish two sentinel centers to monitor child protection abuse in Enugu and Port Harcourt. Continuous technical and supplies support for residential care institutions nation-wide caring for children who lack primary care givers.
- An institutional care study carried out in all four UNICEF zonal offices to make sure that vulnerable children in institutions like orphanages and care centres have access to their basic rights and are protected from exploitation. UNICEF in collaboration with Police, Immigration and NGOs supported the repatriation of almost 300 children rescued from quarries in Ogun State back to Cotonou, Benin Republic in 2003. Efforts are being made to sensitize the affected communities on the rights of children and highlight the evils of child labour.
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