Worried Govt acts on child labour in export industries

Twelve years after a US Congress resolution proposing a ban on imports into the US from industries...

Twelve years after a US Congress resolution proposing a ban on imports into the US from industries suspected of using child labour and forced labour fell through, the spectre of a possible ban is back with the US government notifying ‘proposed procedural guidelines’ for the matter in October. The Government, still trying to douse the global ‘hype’ over a recent sting operation that alleged child labour was used by a vendor of global apparel giant GAP and worried about the prospect of missing its export targets for the year by as much as $15 billion, has swung into action.

At a meeting called by the Commerce Ministry last Thursday and attended by minister of state for commerce Jairam Ramesh, minister of state for labour and employment Oscar Fernandes and women and child development minister Renuka Choudhary, it was decided that the export promotion councils (EPCs) of five key sectors ‘where there is a perception that the use of child labour is significant’ will not only prepare a plan for abolishing the use of child labour, but also examine their entire supply chain to ensure that sub-contractors and suppliers are not using children.

The five-point action plan arrived at the meeting, where NGOs and representatives of EPCs for apparel, handicrafts, gems and jewellery, sports goods and carpets were present, requires these EPCs to conduct annual external social audit on the use of child labour and prepare plans for abolishing it in specific areas such as Varanasi, Badhoi, Jalandhar, Surat and Bhavnagar where the use of such labour is concentrated.

“The three concerned ministries have decided to meet quarterly to review the progress on the action points,” Ramesh said. According to the 2001 census, about 1.26 crore children in the age group 5-14 were working instead of being in school. The states that are the worst offenders as per the census were Uttar Pradesh (0.19 crore), Andhra Pradesh (0.14 crore), Rajasthan (0.13 crore) and Bihar (0.1 crore).

“We cannot divorce exports from social issues. At the multilateral level, India’s position has been and remains that the social issue clauses cannot be brought into the WTO negotiations framework. But there will be pressure,” Ramesh admitted. According to estimates supplied by the EPCs at the meeting, the carpet sector employs 30,000-60,000 children, gems and jewelllery employs 5,000-7,000 workers and the sports goods sector employs a few thousand children, mainly in Jalandhar.

“Footballs constitute 40 per cent of our sports goods exports and the children employed in the sector are involved in stitching the footballs,” Ramesh pointed out. Child labour activists present at Thursday’s meeting admitted that child labour use in export-oriented industries has reduced significantly in the last 15-20 years, but their use in goods produced for the domestic market hasn’t dropped.