The president of Brazil, who also started to work at a young age (11 y/o) made abolishing child labor in Brazil a priority back in 2004. Despite the government, the UN and some other NGO’s efforts, still, more than 7 million children in Brazil are child laborers. And more than half of them work under hazardous conditions, of these, working in the dump site. The United Nations website shares the story of Leandra, a child who works in a dump site with her mother and her brothers. When the supermarket truck appears, men, women and children scramble to get the best garbage. The children who try to climb on board the trucks often fall off or are run over. Although Leandra was never hurt, her 8-year old brother was once thrown off a truck. Yet for all the drudgery and hazards, Leandra barely earned the equivalent of $3 a day selling the collected bottles to a middleman, who makes money exploiting child workers. It is illegal for children in Brazil to work in such dangerous conditions, but the pressures of poverty force parents to take risks to feed their families.
Yes, the main reason is that child labor in Brazil is fuelled by poverty. In many low-income Brazilian communities, children constitute a reserve army of labor. When the adult members in the household do not generate sufficient income, children are usually expected to work. Brazilian children are often employed in places where they can work with their hands, such as in sugar, orange, coffee, or cocoa plantations. Since field workers are often paid according to their output rather than an hourly rate, parents are often tempted to make their children work with them to increase the family’s earnings. As a result, an important indicator for child labor is whether a mother has a paid job or not, as children are likely to work with their mothers. This is particularly the case for young children, especially girls, and children living in rural areas.
In addition to poverty, cultural habits in Brazil also play a significant role in child labor. In the impoverished northern areas of Brazil, most of the people who are parents today started working before they were eight years old. Since child labor was very familiar to them as they were growing up, these Brazilians often fail to view child labor as a serious problem, in contrast to their wealthier western counterparts. The problem of child labor thus becomes trapped in a generational cycle.
I’ve mentioned before that there are several efforts or programs that are implemented to help abolish child labor. A problem faced by government officials is that if they ban child labor immediately and completely may in fact worsen conditions for Brazil’s poorest citizens. It would be a mistake to assume that parents would ensure that their children attend school regularly if they expected harsh legal consequences for allowing them to carry a paid job. Were the government outlaw child labor, parents would likely force their children to work in even less regulated and less visible jobs. Certain areas of work, such as jobs in private households, cannot be effectively regulated by the Brazilian state, and if children work in the home, it is nearly impossible to protect them from abuses.
Again, what does the government do? One, President Lula in cooperation with the UN International Labor Organization (ILO) and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), in attempt to abolish child labor, implemented Bolsa Familia, a financial assistance to needy citizens. The program goes beyond the prohibition of child labor, it also includes giving incentives to those families who ensure that their children goes to school and gets vaccinations. Families who have an income of less than 140 reals per month, are given a monthly stipend of 22 reals and families whose income is 70 reals per month are given 68 reals per month.
Another program of this cooperation is the Bolsa Escola or the “School Scholarship” where the UNICEF grants monetary funding to families below poverty line to help parents send children back to school “where they belong”, because UNICEF recognizes that “education is the best way to fight poverty”.
The number of working children in Brazil has been declining in recent years, due in part to Lula’s commendable efforts to reduce extreme poverty, which is demonstrably the main cause of child labor. Nevertheless, 25.8 percent of families are still classified as very poor in Brazil and are likely to continue to depend on child labor. Consequently, ensuring that children are attending good schools on a regular basis and do not fall into a cycle of child labor must remain as an issue of highest priority in the hearts and minds of Brazilians across the country.
Data from the UN Website
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