Child Labour in the 21st Century:
An Urgent Call for Action & Reform

Heba lives in a village in the heart of Egypt’s jasmine region, Gharbia. Each day begins at 3:00 AM, when she wakes with her family, to start picking jasmine flowers before the sun’s heat can damage them.

Heba, like many jasmine pickers in Egypt, is an “independent picker” who works on a smallholder farm. Her four children, aged between 5 and 15, help her in the fields. The more they pick, the more they earn. On a good night, they might gather 1.5kg of jasmine flowers. After paying a third of her earnings to the landowner, she is left with about $1.50. This small amount, diminished further by Egypt’s soaring inflation, leaves Heba and her family struggling below the poverty line.*

The global picture of child labour

Heba’s story is a microcosm of a global issue. Since 2000, the world has been making steady progress in reducing child labour. However, recent years have seen a reversal of these gains.

Conflicts, crises, and the COVID-19 pandemic have plunged more families into poverty, forcing millions more children into child labour. Economic growth has not been sufficient or inclusive enough to relieve the pressure on many families and communities.

Today, 160 million children are engaged in child labour worldwide, almost one in ten children. Africa has the highest rates, with one-fifth of children, approximately 72 million, involved in child labour. Asia and the Pacific follow, with 7% of all children, or 62 million, working. Together, these regions account for nearly nine out of every ten child labourers globally. The remaining child labourers are spread across the Americas (11 million), Europe and Central Asia (6 million), and the Arab States (1 million).

While child labour is most prevalent in low-income countries, the numbers are higher in middle-income countries. Nine percent of children in lower-middle-income countries and seven percent in upper-middle-income countries are engaged in child labour. In total, 84 million child labourers live in middle-income countries, making up 56% of the global total, with an additional 2 million in high-income countries.**

World Day Against Child Labour 2024: A call to action

This year, World Day Against Child Labour, marked on June 12th, focuses on the theme, “Let’s act on our commitments: End Child Labour!”

It celebrates the 25th anniversary of the adoption of the Worst Forms of Child Labour Convention (No. 182) and calls for renewed efforts to eliminate child labour in all its forms by 2025, as committed under Sustainable Development Goal Target 8.7.

Together with the UN family, we urge the international community to act 

Global Child Forum is calling for the following to be accomplished:

• The effective implementation of ILO Convention No. 182 on the Worst Forms of Child Labour.
• Reinvigorated national, regional, and international action to end all forms of child labour, including through adopting national policies and addressing root causes as highlighted in the 2022 Durban Call to Action.
• Universal ratification and effective implementation of ILO Convention No. 138 on the Minimum Age for Admission to Employment or Work, to provide all children with legal protection against child labour.

Global Child Forum’s role in assessing corporate responsibility

Global Child Forum has been at the forefront of assessing how well companies integrate children’s rights into their value chains. Through our benchmarking efforts, we evaluate the “workplace” indicator, which examines companies’ policies and practices regarding child labour and broader children’s rights issues. In our soon-to-be-released 2024 benchmark, we have scored over 1,800 companies on their commitment toward protecting children’s rights. This comprehensive assessment aims to hold companies accountable and encourage them to adopt more robust measures to prevent child labour and support children’s rights globally.

As we mark this year’s World Day Against Child Labour, let us renew our commitment to ending this grave violation of children’s rights. Heba’s story, and the stories of millions of children worldwide, remind us of the urgency and importance of our collective action. Now is the time to make the elimination of child labour a reality.

*BBC News, BBC Eye Investigations, Luxury perfumes linked to child labour, BBC finds, by Ahmed ElShamy and Natasha Cox, May 28th 2024

**Statistics on child labour from the United Nations, World Day Against Child Labour, 12 June

Image credit (top): Pintau Studio via stock.adobe.com