Child labour has been one of the earliest and abiding concerns of the ILO. The ILO adopted its first Convention on Child Labour in 1919, the year in which it was founded. A large number of Conventions have been adopted by the ILO since then, culminating in the Minimum Age Convention, 1973. This Convention provides guidelines on the conditions under which a child may or may not work and the direction in which the national policy should move in order to eliminate child labour progressively and protect the working children during the transitional phase.

Experience has, however, shown that a purely legislative approach is not sufficient to stop child labour. Since the early 1980's, the ILO has, therefore, engaged in a wide range of activities on research, documentation and technical assistance to various countries on child labour. In 1992 it launched IPEC with financial resources provided by the Government of Germany. IPEC has grown to be the largest technical co-operation programme of the ILO, implemented world-wide in twenty-three countries now and supported by almost all major donor countries.

The main objective of IPEC is to eliminate child labour progressively by strengthening the capability of countries to deal with the problem and promoting a world-wide movement against the practice. IPEC adopts a phased and multi-sectoral strategy which comprises providing assistance to national organisations for -

• a situational analysis

• developing and implementing a national policy on child labour

• building the capacities of national institutions and promoting a broad alliance of partners.

• strengthening legislation on child labour and its enforcement

• creating awareness of the problem at different levels

• direct action with child workers.

IPEC was launched in Nepal in 1995. Following a national workshop on policy and programming on child labour, various Action Programmes have been formulated and implemented in the country by national organisations in accordance with the broad global strategy of IPEC.

One of these Action Programmes concerns this study on child labour in the tea plantations in Nepal by GEFONT. The tea industry has traditionally been extremely labour intensive and has employed children in large numbers. The child workers are generally the children of the plantation workers and are not often included formally in the work force. A key element of the study was to involve the workers in the survey on child labour and to create an awareness in them about the consequences of practice. This made the study more reliable as the workers came forward with information about the employment of children and suggestions on how to prevent child labour.

The study shows a steep decline in the employment of children in tea gardens in recent years. GEFONT attributes this to the enactment of the Labour Act (1992) which has outlawed the employment of children. Paradoxically, the workers appear unhappy at the denial of employment to their children. About 43 per cent of the children of the plantation workers in the age group of 5-15 years, do not go to school at all. About 25 per cent of the children are engaged in work either in the household or outside and the remaining 18 per cent idle away their time. The main causes for the low enrolment in school appear to be the dependence of the family on the income of children as well as its inability to afford the expenses of schooling. Significantly, a large number of children do not go to school as they have to look after younger children at home. Few crèches exist in the tea gardens and women are also forced to carry young children on their back when they work.

The study has revealed many interesting aspects of the living and working conditions in tea gardens. It will be useful in designing interventions to eliminate child labour. It will also be of interest to the general reader who is concerned about the conditions of labour in this vital sector of the economy of the country.

Hirak Ghosh
Sub-regional Adviser (South Asia)
International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour
ILO, Kathmandu