Use of Child Labour

By Jaiden lee 7P
Introduction
Child labour is the use of children in an
industry or business often when it is
considered illegal and exploitative. Child
labour is an issue that is happening around
the world and many children suffer to the
hard-domestic work mentally and physically
in their lives.

Causes of Child Labour

Child labour is
caused due to
poverty and
people needing
money in poor
countries, using
children to gain
their income and survive. Children are
often used in forms of slavery i.e.
sales and trafficking of children, the
use or offering of a child for illicit
activities such as the production and trafficking of drugs and domestic work
which is likely to harm the child’s health and safety. 1 in every 4 kids
experience child labour in poor countries and children aging 5-11 years old has
to do at least 1 hour of economic work or 21 hours of unpaid household
services every week, children aged 12-14 years old has to do at least 14 hours
of economic work or 21 hours of unpaid household services every week and
children aged 15-17 years old has to do 43 hours of economic work every
week. Due to the overwhelming amount of work children experience, children
will often get sick and even starve to death due to the child not being provided
enough medication and food.

Child Labour in Ghana

Ghana is a country located in Africa experiencing child labour. Children in
Ghana experiences mental trauma and gets long-term damage to their bodies
due to the hard-labour work. 21% of all children in Ghana aging from 5-17
years old experience child labour with 14% of them
working in hazardous forms of child labour. For
poor households, the children work in
agriculture and fishing industries but for some
unfortunate children, mostly girls, are used for
the worst forms of child labour i.e. sale of children, child prostitution and
trafficking of children. The environment in Ghana is polluted too as a result of
child labour, as kids also do domestic work such as burning fuels and mining
gold. The harmful gas, Nitrogen dioxide, which is created due to this, pollutes
the air which results in the environment being harmed and children getting
respiratory problems due to the gas which they inhale while they work. As
Ghana is one of the top 10 countries that produces gold, children will continue
to suffer to this issue as there will be more demands for gold which will mean
children having to work more, resulting in them having high risk of getting
respiratory problems and also a damaged and unhealthy body.
A strategy that can help reduce child labour in Ghana can be more severe
punishments enforced by the government or a change in law. Fines or jailtime
of people using children for slavery will be increased and the children that
were affected will be returned back to the family if they were separated or
either be put in an orphanage if they were treated cruelly by their family. Due
to the heftier consequences, less people will encourage the use of child labour
and children will feel safer and be healthy and the environment will improve
due to forms of slavery that affect the environment not being used as much i.e.
mining and burning of fuels.
Child labour is an on-going issue of children being used in forms of slavery that
affect their mental and physical well-being and reducing the use of child labour
will make the world a better place for the economy, environment and children.

References:
Unicef,2015, Prevention of Child Labour, viewed 20 September 2020,
www.unicef.org>ghana>prevention-child-labour
ILO,2020, Child Labour, viewed 20 September 2020, www.ilo.org>global>standards>child-
labour>lang—en
HRW,2015, Child Labour and Corporate Responsibility in Ghana’s Artisanal Gold Mines,
viewed 20 September 2020, www.hrw.org>report>2015/06/10>precious-metal-cheap-
labour