Have childhood or work?160 million children have no choice

Readers note: The country offers the future planet section for its daily and global information contribution on the 2030 Agenda.If you want to support our journalism, subscribe here.

Rolin Cristiano Aarón Caal Batz is just five years but a very clear thing in life: he wants to be drummer.Grab any pot that her mother, Daysi Oralia Batz Lem, hides and shakes them and hits them to make music.“And yes it sounds good, I know.Although it is not a very good battery, ”says the little one through a video call.For this humble Guatemalan family, which enters just over 40 euros per month, buying an instrument to Rolin only fits in the child's dreams, who for a year does not even have time to improvise with the cauldrons."It is better to help dad," explains the mother, 24 years.

Photo gallery |The life of an adult being just a child

When I turned four, Rolin "could" load firewood and go to the river for water.Sometimes alone and sometimes with his father, farmer and supplier of the only salary that enters the house.Between both men, they plant cardamom, milpa (corn) and beans.Part of the harvest is for your own consumption and another to sell in the market."They also buy it to me, I know," he says proud.In addition to drummer, he wants to be like his dad.A wish that the mother is choking: “I would like to study and be licensed.But you have to learn.At 12 or 13, he will really have to work.It is always necessary ".

Rolin is one of the more than 160 million children forced to stop being, according to the latest study of the International Labor Organization (ILO) and UNICEF: Child labor: World estimates 2020, trends and the way to follow.Of these, half are between five and 11, the age range at which early incorporation to the labor market has increased the most.Pandemia threatens to include another nine million in the late 2022 abyss at the end of 2022."Although urgent measures are not taken, 46 million more could be," says Joaquín Nieto Sáinz, director of the ILO office for Spain.Until now, the figure affects one in ten boys in the world.

This global database, published every four years, reveals the first setback in the tendency to descent in this rate and in the fight to eradicate the dire destiny of these children of the last 20 years.Since 2016, about 8.4 million children have joined the list."That there are 160 million boys and girls trapped in this, in the 21st century, when more wealth is created in the world, it is unacceptable and a collective failure," Nieto criticizes, who also regrets that goal 8.7 of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), for the eradication of child labor in 2025, "is unattainable"."These are very negative figures in a year like this," he adds in allusion to 2021, declared as the international year for the elimination of this systematic violation of the rights of the minor by the United Nations.

"After almost a second year of confinements, school closures, economic crises and cuts in national budgets, families are being forced to make heartbreaking decisions," Henrietta Fore, executive director of UNICEF, a statement..Life was not easy for them before.But pandemic has been a turning point.Something that the batz family knows well."Sales were not even half.And we had to eat, ”explains the Guatemalan mother."Here is what touches.What do I do? ”He asks.

"They are not miniature adults"

Weight overload, exposure to chemicals or carcinogenic substances and musculoskeletic damage are behind 79 of the 160 million children's jobs.Dangerous works also increased by more than 6.5 million."Children are not miniature adults.They are children.And health damage at this age is especially serious because they will compromise the development of this generation, ”says Nieto.

For Carmen Molina, director of Awareness and Childhood Policies of UNICEF Spain, the key is on a battery of complementary responses.On the one hand, promote economic measures so that families have no need to "pull their children".And, on the other hand, encourage benefits for school son so that enrollments do not fall.And, according to the study, 80% of the children currently work, do not go to school."Education is the only answer.But it has to be quality training.And parents have to understand that it is a priority to continue studying.That is only going to penetrate low -income families with incentives so that they do not follow the same path as their parents, ”says the expert.

Child, African and future farmer

Evelyn (Uganda) and Kofi (Ghana) have much in common even if they are separated thousands of kilometers.They do not exceed 15 years, they live in rural areas and have no choice but to work so that their families can get ahead.Evelyn's day does not fall from 11 hours a day.Dry sardines and load stones near Lake Victoria for 1.5 euros a day.Kofi, 11, distributes vegetables from the market to the customer's house carrying up to 20 kilos per order.Everyone would prefer to be at school and be the ones who receive care, not provide them.But hunger, closing schools following the COVID and Pandemia itself has not given them option.

These testimonies, collected by Human Rights Watch..According to the data collected by UNICEF and ILO, the face of the exploited minor is male - 97 million boys compared to 63 million girls–;African, this is the continent that brings together the greatest number of cases and where the rate has grown most since 2012;And it is dedicated to agriculture, as this sector absorbs 70% of these minors, followed by the service area, with 20% (31.4 million), and the industry, with 10% (16.5 million).

The common minimum denominator is inequality.This is considered by Antonio Josué Díaz Rodríguez, an impact technician in Action: “The greater the situation of social exclusion and poverty of the family and the lower the presence of the State and the weakest are the public educational and social protection policies, the greater thethere is risk of child labor and that this is more harmful and harmful to the health, development and well -being of the child ”.

Although UNICEF and ILO study handle figures prior to COVID-19, experts warn that the consequences of the pandemic "will be very serious".Save The Children estimates that about 9.7 million boys and girls are at risk of never returning to classrooms.Michela Ranieri, an expert in foreign policy and humanitarian action of this NGO regrets that this situation is not new: “During the Ebola outbreak in Sierra Leone, the boys were used in mining and retail trade, while girls were employedfirewood for sale.When schools reopened, they were rarely encouraged by their families to return to the classrooms ”.In the HRW report, the vast majority of the 81 children interviewed assured that they work because their families "did not have enough food" and that they continued working "even after the situation improved relatively".

Therefore, all the experts interviewed affect the same thing: it is impossible to end child labor without promoting education and ending poverty.But how?Companies and their social responsibility are fundamental.Especially microenterprises and small businesses that display their activity at the lower levels of supply chains."It is in which the risks of child labor and violation of other human rights are more pronounced," the report dictates.

Thus, eradicating this "other pandemic" is also in the hands of the consumer."That in Europe there is no concept of child labor as such, it does not mean that we do not contribute," explains Nieto.“The flowers we give, the clothes we wear, the toys we buy and the jewels we wear.It is very likely that, if you throw the production chain, there are hands of children involved ”.

You can follow the future planet on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram, and subscribe here to our ‘Newsletter’.