[1]

LAW 210

Legislation and Child Labour in Pakistan, what are the alternatives?

Research Paper submitted by Kiran Arif Mehdi (12020044)

Abstract

Child labour is a complex, multi-dimensional and socio-economic phenomenon. It is the byproduct of structurally created poverty. Legislative policies and child labour laws which aim to combat child labour have existed for long, both at the national and the international front. But despite these efforts the problem of child labour persists. It is imperative to determine whether legislative policies are sufficient to reduce the menaces associated with child labour, in today’s world, which is greatly marked by the influence of global political forces.

Introduction:

Back in the 18th century, the influence of industrial revolution on agriculture,

manufacturing and other core sectors of an economy was marked by an increase

in the amount of work children were required to do. As a consequence, children

were even engaged in to risky hazardous labour. It was only in the 21st century

that the concern within the international community grew regarding child labour.

In this regard, the inappropriate areas where children were employed were

identified and policies were made to rectify child exploitation. Thus, both

industrialized and developing nations “codified protection in labor and public

health law” (Fassa, Parker, Scanlon 1). Ever since, various laws coexist at both the

national and international level to fight child labour but their enforcement has

remained weak1. Although, children have acquired a certain degree of protection in

countries where child labour laws and policies have been effectively enforced but

even there the problems associated with child labour persist.

1 “Child labour is prohibited in virtually all economies, and yet it continues to flourish, and indeed may be a growing phenomenon with economic recession in industrialized countries and persistent poverty in developing countries, nowhere does child labour feature high on the priority list of governmental and international agencies, it was only during the International Year of Child (IYC 1979) that international attention became fully focused on the problem of child labour.” (Fyfe 1)

It is thus instructive to highlight the role of legislative policies in fighting child

labour. Since the inception of Pakistan and even before that in United India, a

series of child labor laws existed, however, the implementation of such laws was

weak and as a consequence Pakistan remains one of those countries where the

incidence of child labor and particularly child exploitation is high. It can be

asserted that legislation alone is not enough to fight child labor; at both the

national and international level, it has to intersect with policies that make child

employment in hazardous areas an expensive phenomenon both for the

impoverished families and the state. This paper integrates of the impact of both

national and international child labor laws; interplay of global forces such as trade

sanctions linked with trade openness and the role of compulsory educational

policies at the national level and determines their effectiveness in mitigating the

adverse consequences of child labor. Although, this paper attempts to discuss the

wide array of child labour laws in Pakistan but it primarily seeks to analyze the

effectiveness of a comprehensive legislative policy such as Employment of

Children Act 1991, also it will analyze the implication of an alternative legislative

policy such as Compulsory Primary Education Act 1994 and discuss its

consequences on child labour. Lastly, through the lens of political economy it will

discuss the role of trade openness in terms of policies which aim to specifically

target child labour by making it an expensive form of labour by introducing trade

sanctions and labeling of products associated with child labour, in a developing

economy such as Pakistan, marked by the domination of a feudalistic social

structure.

Literature Review:

Recently, the International Labour Organization (ILO)2 estimated that there were

211 million working children aged 5-14 years around the world, although this

represents a significant reduction in child labour compared to the earlier

estimations, 3 but this figure ignores the children who have been trafficked and are

into forced and bonded labour.

In developing economies, child labour is considered to be a symptom of poverty

and a byproduct of several complex issues such as poorly developed financial

markets, inefficient enforcement and monitoring of legal regulations, hierarchal

social structures, and an increased demand for cheap labour combined with

insufficient collateral for the impoverished parents. There is considerable evidence

in the literature that that child labour and poverty are mutually reinforcing, poor

parents send their children to work in order to survive as a family. (Neumayer 43,

Fyfe 25, Joshi 11)

Moehling in assessing the impact of child labour laws, points out in the United

States, in the 19th and 20th centuries, the reduction observed in child labour cannot

be attributed to legislature alone; the interplay of important economic factors

reduced child labour. (Moehling 93) Alec Fyfe suggests that awareness of the

2 Three groups of working children are identified in ILO figures: (1) Economically active children/working children refers to children aged 5-17 years who undertook at least 1 hour of economic work per week; (2) Child labour refers to children aged 5-14 years engaged in at least 1 hour of economic work per week; (3) Children in hazardous work refers to children aged 5-17 years in at least one hour of economic activity per week in occupation deemed hazardous, including children working in mining and construction, working with heavy machinery, exposed to pesticides or working for 43 hours or more per week. (Fassa, Parker and Scanlon 1)3 In 2004, ILO estimated that 250 million children were prone to child labour. (Fassa, Parker and Scanlon 4)

harmful effects of child labour occurred in the industrialized countries during the

last century. Child labour was reduced through a combination of economic changes

which decreased the demand for child workers through the introduction of

universal schooling, which absorbed the supply of children for work. (Fyfe 4)

Krueger and Donohue in this regard argue that a legal restriction on child labor

unless accompanied by free education, induces poor families to make their

children work in low return informal sector of the economy. This further makes the

poor socially and economically deprived. (Krueger and Donohue 419)

Globalization has been at the forefront to address child labour since long. Sadia

Toor argues that, “it is impossible to understand and even address the problem of

child labour without placing it against the back-drop of the dynamics of current

neo-liberal political economic system.” (Toor 194) She further debates that the

only way in which the issue of social and labour rights can be given importance in

a “socially disembedded “ world economy is through political engagement with the

forces of globalization. (Toor 206).

Proponents of globalization argue that, globalization in terms of foreign direct

investment and increased trade openness solves child labour problems and the

countries that remain closed, remain poor, underdeveloped and face adverse

consequences in terms of meeting labour rights. (Chakrabarty 1683)

Neumayer is of the view that trade liberalization in a developing country abundant

with unskilled labour is likely to raise the relative return to unskilled labour and the

country might have an incentive to cut back on investment in skills and education

and respond by increasing child labour. However, he is of the view that increased

trade openness need not increase the demand for child labour if children mainly

work in non-trade able sectors of the economy. (Neumayer 44) But the developing

countries prone to problems such as inadequate labour standards, low wages

coupled with a huge supply of unskilled labour, ineffective policies to fight child

labour, variations in enforcement of policies that protect labour rights, are

considered lucrative for foreign investors. However, globalization optimists are also

of the view that trade openness is associated with the reduction in the incidence of

child labour because open countries have better opportunities of access to credit

which reflects increased investment in education and a lower incidence of child

labour. (Neumayer 45-6, Edmond 200)

Basu analyses the impact of trade sanctions on child labour, he argues that

recently in the context of trade openness the practice of the labeling of products

made out of child labour has emerged, such labels raise the price of exports and

serve to price discriminate between consumers in importing countries which prefer

products made without child labour. (Basu 150)

Child labour laws addressing child labour at the international level:

In 1919, United Nations founded the International Labor Organization (ILO) to

promote social justice by upholding workers rights and developing labor standards.

With the establishment of ILO it was realized that the problem of child labor cannot

be thrown at the mercy or discretion of the nations alone and child labor being a

multi-dimensional required international cooperation. United Nations in 1989

adopted a convention on the rights of child to highlight several practices to combat

child labour. Article 104 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and

Cultural rights affirmed the prevalence of child labour and demonstrated that

working children are exploited and are required to do work that is life threatening.

(Bishoyi 85)

Article 32 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child requires the states to take

action to prevent the worst forms of child labour, it states that “state parties shall

in particular, provide for a minimum age for admission to employment, and provide

for

the appropriate regulation of the hours and conditions of employment moreover,

provide for appropriate penalties or other sanctions to ensure the effective

enforcement of the present article.” (Fasser, Parker and Scanlon 81)

In 1999, the ILO Convention formulated the act for the Prohibition and Immediate

Action for the Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labour; it regarded child

slavery, child prostitution and child work in illicit activities as “unconditional worst

forms of child labour”.

Another ILO convention concerning forced or compulsory labour required each

member to suppress and not make use of any form of forced or compulsory

labour.5 The Convention concerning the Protection of Wages is also applicable to

child labour. It requires that “wages shall be paid directly to the worker concerned

4 “Children and young persons should be protected from economic and social exploitation. Their employment in work harmful to their morals or health or dangerous to life or likely to hamper their normal development should be punishable by law. States should also set age limits below which the paid employment of child labour should be prohibited and punishable by law”. (Article 10 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights)5It states that political coercion or punishment for holding or expressing political views ideologically opposed to the established political, social or economic system. (Fasser, Parker and Scanlon 84)

except as may be otherwise provided by national laws or regulation, collective

agreement or arbitration award or where the worker concerned has agreed to the

contrary.” (Fasser, Parker and Scanlon 84)

In 1992, ILO established the International Programme on the Elimination of Child

Labour (IPEC) with the objective of eliminating child labour through international

assistance. During 2006-2007, IPEC conducted several actions both regional and

worldwide against child labour, for instance it promoted primary education to

enable families move out of the circle of poverty. It also eradicated the worst forms

of child labour by cooperating with governments.

It has been observed that although the scope of international legislation in

addressing child labour is wide ranging in terms of specifying laws to identify and

prohibit the worst forms of child labour but it has also been debated that

legislation in itself is not sufficient to secure child rights. (Fashi 14, Toor 211,

Baland 1127) To address this problem, ILO in this regard aims to tackle wider

determinants of child labour such as poverty and lack of access to the basic right

for education through the cooperation with both states and non-governmental

institutions.

National legislative policies to protect rights of children:

Adoption of ILO conventions and recommendations does not mean that these are

enforced in all member countries. These conventions can come into play only after

their ratification by the concerned national governments. A state may enforce

them fully or partly or may not enforce them at all. (Fyfe 130) In many cases the

governments are simply unable to reduce child labour because of the extreme

poverty of these countries. Thus, for the developing countries it is important to

identify areas and sectors where the incidence of child labour is high. These areas

should be identified by the assistance of ILO and other international agencies to

undertake development in those areas. (Joshi 91)

Since the inception of Pakistan, legislative policies to curb child labour have

remained an integral part of the constitution of Pakistan. Back in 1969, in General

Yahya Khan’s military regime a labour law was passed which prohibited the

employment of children below the age of 12 years in any commercial shop or

industrial area; later in 1977 General Zia ul Haq raised this age to 14 years.

Employment of Children Act 1991 of Pakistan’s constitution remains an important

legislative policy in this regard; it prohibits the employment of children beyond the

age of 14 years in sectors other than agriculture or household enterprises.

Tazeen Fasih in her work critically analyzes the impact of legislation on child labour

in Pakistan, she particularly talks about the Employment of Children Act 1991, she

discusses that historically no region has ever remained completely free from this

problem and since 1990s there have been worldwide movements for the

eradication of worst forms of child labour. Countries and governments have moved

from a complete denial of the existence of the problem of legislation in curbing

child labour towards adopting positive actions for tackling the issue. Pakistan in

this regard has implemented a few minimum working age laws and labour

legislation. After ratifying the United Nation’s Convention on the Rights of the Child

1989, the Government of Pakistan in April 1991 implemented the most

comprehensive nationwide law against child labour in the form of Employment of

Children Act 1991. She further argues that in Pakistan (pre-partition), labour laws

enacted since 1920s were not consistent in defining a particular cut-off age for

work and employment of children and applied to only a few occupations, similarly

there has been a dearth of such laws in the un-organized sector of Pakistan’s

economy. She maintains that the Employment of Children Act 1991 is more

comprehensive because in terms of penalizing the offenders it is more severe than

other minimum age laws, the maximum penalty to its offenders can extend to an

imprisonment for up to a year or a fine of Rs. 20000. Furthermore, considering the

ILO Convention of the Worst Forms of Child labour, Pakistan signed and ratified it

August 2001but no measures have so far been taken to enforce it domestically. In

all the child labour laws implemented so far in Pakistan the minimum age specified

that is 14 years is far below the internationally accepted standards. (Fashi 6)

In assessing the impact of the Employment of Children Act 1991, Fashi’s work

provides valuable insights, she has tried to identify whether this act has the

desirable impact of reducing children’s employment by empirically analyzing

micro-level data from the Pakistan Integrated Household Survey 1991, with the

implementation of this act, there has been a general trend of a decline in the

working of 13 year old boys only, but there appears to be no significant effect of

this policy on girls relative to boys because one of the short comings of this law is

that it does not prohibit working in agriculture and domestic services and Pakistani

girls are more prone to work in both these sectors.

There has been a dearth of such legislative policies in Pakistan that prevent

employment in agricultural and domestic sector and to ensure effective

implementation of child labour legislative policies there is a dire need to

complement child labour legislative policies with measures that minimize

employment in these two sectors. It is in these sectors that child labour monitoring

is both inefficient and expensive. The strong domination of the feudal lords in the

agrarian sector of Pakistan invokes further challenges in effective implementation,

because land lords oppose policies which might be in conflict with their personal

interests. These feudal lords also exert strong influence on the judiciary, politics

and bureaucracy in Pakistan which is a primary cause of exploitation of children.

(Toor 19)

Despite these efforts the problem of child labour continues to persist in many parts

of the country which reflects the extent of our commitment to social and economic

justice and equality of opportunity. The lack of significant progress in the

elimination of child labour is attributed amongst other factors on the inefficiency in

implementing these laws. It is thus suggestive to employ measures for the proper

planning, policy formulation and program implementation for the overall welfare of

children.

The role of globalization in eradicating child labour:

This paper argues that from a political economy perspective, an open economy has

less incentive to preserve the traditional, cultural and institutional framework that

promotes child labour in a country. The return to skilled labour is influenced by

world markets and is less dependent on domestic supply of unskilled labour. In

closed economies skilled labour and owners of capital benefit by preserving the

cultural and institutional framework that promotes the large supply of cheap

unskilled labour. (Gani 5)

Multi-National Cooperation’s (MNCs) that are concerned with their brand name

and global reputation do not want to be portrayed as exploiting poor children,

considering this they have under taken some effective policy measures in the past

to address the menaces of child labour. In 1996, the International Labour Rights

Fund launched the Foul Ball campaign to induce player pressure on Nike, Adidas

and other major marketers of soccer ball who used balls produced in Pakistan

which involved child labour. FIFA (International Federation of Football Association)

worried about its image considering the fact that they used soccer balls made by

poorly treated child workers in LDCs. Thus, FIFA and Sialkot Chamber of Commerce

and Industry which represented soccer ball manufacturers signed an agreement

with ILO and UNICEF to reduce child labour and provide health and training

services to the children who were removed from work. The effort to reduce the use

of child labour in this sector succeeded and strict measures were adopted which

were complemented by strict monitoring6. (Chakrabarty 1684)

Alternative legislative policies in eradicating child labour:

Schools are considered one of the primary alternatives to intensive child labour.

There have been arguments against child labour based on positive consequences

6 ILO reported that about 6000 children had been in village education in Pakistan. (Fassa,

Parker and Scanlon 14)

of reducing children work and increasing their learning because intensive work

diminishes their likelihood of school success. ILO has implemented strategic

policies over the past decade, which includes the prohibitation of all forms of child

labour particularly during the age when the school is compulsory. (Fassa, Parker

and Scanlon 12, Fyfe 131) It is suggestive that children’s work beyond a certain

point in hours and intensity can impede their academic achievement in schooling

and low academic achievement leads to reduced opportunities in the future.

National and global campaigns to provide quality education for all children can

induce local government to improve schools and lower the incidence of harmful

child labour.

There is a paucity of empirical evidence in determining the effect of compulsory

schooling policies on the reduction of child labour. One such policy is the

Compulsory Primary Education Act of 1994; this act stated that children aged 5-10

years have to attend school until they complete primary education. The parents

and guardians who failed to send children to school by the provision of Act shall be

fined or imprisoned. The penalties were higher if the child were employed as well.

Tazeen Fasih in her work seeks to argue that compulsory schooling laws can be

integral not only in reducing child labour but also in increasing the literacy rate in

the country. This legislative policy, as Fasih argues, provided inconclusive results

because it was hampered by issues of monitoring. The dropout rates of girls

decreased, however, the compulsory education act was not widely successful in

eradicating child labour. (Fasih 16)

Conclusion:

In view of the analysis put forth in this paper it can be concluded that declarations

and conventions associated with child labour are not enough. Action against child

labour must come from within states and be supported from outside. Trade

pressures and incentives from international consumers can lead to improved

labour standards in LDCs. It has been shown that the cooperation from

governments and international agencies notably the ILO cannot be

underestimated. A mix of pressures from both domestic and foreign activists and

democratic governments concerned with human rights can improve the lives of

working children in LDCs. Lastly it is vital to point out that the efficient

enforcement of national policies should be considered an integral. This suggests,

implementing strict monitoring programs to correct the abuses in child labour.

Social regulations and outright ban on child labour are only successful in

eradicating child labour if they are enforced. Enforceability is low if socio-economic

incentives for child labour are strong particularly when state structures are weak.

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