Think tank calls for stepping up fight against child labour

AMMAN — The most recent study on child labour, which took place in 2016, showed that only 20 per cent of child labourers were of Syrian and other nationalities, while the rest were Jordanians, according to the Phenix Centre for Economic Studies. 

The study was conducted by national institutions and the International Labour Organisations (ILO) in Jordan, the centre’s Director Ahmad Awad said. 

Awad directly linked the phenomenon to living condition, stating that if economic situations improve, child labour will decrease.

“The education system is another factor. The more attractive it is for children, the more it motivates them to stay in school, but when the education system is unattractive, it causes students to drop out,” Awad said, noting that those who drop out could also be prone to child labour.

Internationally, ILO statistics show that the number of child labourers working in different sectors reached 152 million around the globe in 2019. Of those, 73 million work in jobs classified as “dangerous” in the Asia-Pacific region, as cited by a study the Phenix Centre released last June. 

The 2016 study conducted by national institutions and the ILO, showed that around 70,000 children were working in Jordan at the time, 45,000 of whom worked in jobs classified as “dangerous”. 

The study classified child labour as work involving children under 16, having those aged 16 and 17 work for 26 hours or more a week and having anyone under 18 work in a job that poses risk and danger.

Dangerous jobs include using hazardous machinery, using or making explosives, dealing with fire, gas or chemicals and work that requires physical effort in dusty, loud, hot or cold environments, in addition to working in mines, underwater and in hotels, restaurants or night clubs. 

The ILO and national institutes conducted a similar study back in 2007, which at the time revealed that 33,000 children were labourers in Jordan, indicating that the number of Jordanian child labourers doubled in a decade.

The Phenix Centre study cited official figures showing that the poverty rate stood at 13.3 per cent in 2008, increased to 14.4 per cent in 2010 and reached nearly 20 per cent in 2014. The study noted that no measures have been taken since to provide updated data on poverty in the Kingdom. 

On the impact of child labour, the ILO study said that “children face mistreatment, humiliation and in many cases sexual assault during their work, and many child labourers suffer from mental, social and physical issues”. 

It also revealed that many end up with disabilities or feeling underappreciated and unjustly treated, leaving them to “rebel and deviate from the values of society”.

In regards to wages, the study showed that the average income among working children is JD171 monthly — JD174 among Jordanians and JD159 among Syrians — and female child labourers receive an average of JD190 compared with JD170 among males. 

The Phenix Centre study recommended reconsidering economic policies that have been implemented over the past decade and are still being implemented, which the study says have led to increasing poverty rates. 

The study also called for the better implementation of anti-poverty policies to combat the source problem, and improving the social protection network to provide a better life for the underprivileged. 

The recommendations included improving the education system to reduce the number of dropouts in addition to intensifying penalties on businesses that employ children as well as creating a regularly updated database on the topic.