11 May 2005
About This Issue
Creating a safe and healthy world for our children is as important a task as any that exists. Yet millions of children around the world remain victims of poverty, illness, armed conflict, and exploitive and forced labor.
The child on our cover, photographed by writer/director/cameraman Robin Romano, is pounding clay into bricks in West Bengal, India. As part of a feature documentary called Stolen Childhoods, Romano portrays child labor in eight countries and reports on programs to remove child laborers from work. "Brick kilns and gravel quarries are a common sight in West Bengal, Orissa, and the surrounding states of India," Romano writes in a Web site, www.stolenchildhoods.org, describing his photos. "The children that work here are exploited 12-16 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year. Their world consists only of these mud holes, drying fields, kilns, rock piles, and grinders. At night they sleep in the open or in makeshift shelter where sanitary conditions are nonexistent. There are no schools here, and for many there isn't even a family. Over one-third of the children working at this kiln and one-fourth of the children at the quarry have been shipped here from other areas, where their parents have been forced to either sell them into slavery or are dependent on the meager wages that these children can provide."
We examine this month some of the noteworthy initiatives under way to combat abusive child labor. The editors of Economic Perspectives wish to thank U.S. Secretary of Labor Elaine L. Chao, the staff of the department's International Child Labor Program, and the International Labor Organization (ILO) for their guidance and time in helping to produce this publication. We are also grateful to numerous groups that have provided input and insight on an issue that requires the commitment of a broad coalition working to rescue children from environments that are physically dangerous and psychologically damaging.
In her introduction, Secretary Chao notes that on June 12, 2005, countries around the world will observe World Day Against Child Labor to recognize the commitments being taken by governments, nongovernmental organizations, and industry to eradicate the worst forms of child labor. This year there will be a special emphasis on eliminating child labor in mining. Pilot projects developed by the International Labor Organization (ILO) have demonstrated how to eliminate child labor in mining and quarrying communities by helping these communities acquire legal rights, organize cooperatives or other productive units, improve the health and safety and productivity of adult workers, and secure such essential services as schools, clean water, and sanitation systems.
We hope that this issue of Economic Perspectives, published by the Department of State, helps our interactive and print audiences to understand more fully the plight faced by the young girl pictured on our cover and the many efforts under way to help her and the many thousands of children in situations like hers around the world.
The Editors
From the May 2005 edition of eJournal USA
