Child Labour And Sweatshops

The International Labor Organization (ILO) says 250 million children from the ages of five and fourteen, work in developing countries. 7% in Latin America, 32% in Africa and 61% in Asia.

Some are confined and beaten and are slave labour, denied the right to leave the workplace. Many have been abducted. They are deprived of an education and a normal childhood.

Nike presents a good public image by offering charity and giving equipment and likes to remind the general public that it has arranged stitching centers in places such as Sialkot, Pakistan. Still, Nike has been accused of employing child labour in the production of its soccer balls in Pakistan.

Many children work in sweatshops in nations around the world, where they are subjected to severe and brutal working conditions, as they are exploited, abused and arbitrarily disciplined.

Some of the industries involved are:

•Shoes and Copy Handbags
The major problem is found with sneakers and athletic shoes, as the majority are manufactured in sweatshops in Asian countries, including Reebok shoes.

•Sporting Goods
From cricket balls to soccer balls, many are created in Asian sweatshops

•Brassware and Base Metal Articles
Children take out molten metal from moulds in furnaces at approximately 2000 degrees Fahrenheit and are involved in nearly all the process of brassware production.

•Clothing
Garment workers in the United States are mainly immigrant women who work 60-80 hours a week, without minimum wage or overtime pay. Overseas, children are forced into working in clothing sweatshops.

•Rugs
Nearly one million children are illegally employed creating hand-knotted rugs worldwide. Approximately 75% of Pakistan's carpet weavers are girls under 14 years of age.

•Toys
Toys made in countries like Vietnam, China, Thailand or Malaysia frequently use child labour.

•Fireworks
Fireworks are manufactured in India using child labour.

•Chocolate
Many children are trafficked across the borders from neighbouring countries, to produce 43% of the world's cocoa beans on the Ivory Coast. Child labour is big business.

•Coffee
Coffee is the second largest United States import, after oil. Many small coffee farmers are forced to accept prices for their coffee that are under the cost of production, thrusting them into an endless cycle of debt and poverty, frequently using child labour.

Children are trafficked for the sex industry, camel races in the Middle East, used to pay off a debt, garbage collectors, in mines, to being forced to operate as professional pickpockets in Romania, or being made soldiers in bloody conflicts. Many are involved in theft and drug trafficking.

Other industries in which child labour is rampant are leather, wool cleaning, wood and cork glass, products furniture and fixtures, rubber products, printing, publishing and allied trades. Countless numbers of children are employed as domestic servants, workers in hotels, wayside shops, canteens, hawkers, restaurants, sweet and ice crème vendors and newspaper sellers.

The list seems continuous, in spite of the legislation disallowing child labour.