01 August 2008
Child Labor In Brazil: The Government Commitment
By Patrick del Vecchio
Patrick del Vecchio is the U.S. Department of State labor officer in São Paulo, Brazil.
Brazil's government and industry, with the support of international and nongovernmental organizations, are committed to eradicating child labor in the country. One particular effort provides stipends to families to encourage them to keep their children who are at-risk for child labor in school. Other efforts include inspection and enforcement at the state level directed at child labor, as well as programs targeted at specific sectors of the Brazilian economy and at specific industries.
The bad news about child labor in Brazil is that it remains an unfortunate fact of life. Roughly four million children between the ages of five and 17 work in Brazil. The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) estimated that as of 2003, some seven percent of Brazilian children between the ages of five and 14 worked.
But the very good news about child labor in Brazil is that, during the past 11 years, a large-scale effort by the national government, the International Labor Organization (ILO), local businesses and corporations, and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) has cut the number of children at work by 50 percent.
FEDERAL GOVERNMENT INITIATIVES
Since the 1990s, Brazil has made a concerted effort to eradicate child labor. Shortly after his inauguration in January 1995, former president Fernando Henrique Cardoso declared child labor to be an abhorrent practice and an abuse of human rights. He said the goal of his government would be to do everything possible to wipe out child labor, and he made it clear that Brazil would neither excuse nor justify the practice.
In 1996, the Cardoso government took an important step: it instituted the Bolsa-Escola ("bolsa"), or school stipend. Designed to help keep at-risk children in school, the program supplies poor families with a small stipend for each school-age child. A family continues to receive the stipend only if the school certifies the child's attendance record. The program is administered by local governments within Brazil's 27 states.
President Luis Inacio "Lula" da Silva, upon taking office in 2003, continued the bolsa program, along with other welfare payments to needy families.
Another important effort of the federal government has been to increase labor inspections aimed at discovering child labor. Brazil's Ministry of Labor has mandated that every regional office have a unit and inspectors responsible for child labor. In addition, the ministry is creating a special task force to combat child labor that will involve a dedicated corps of inspectors to pursue with child labor complaints.
The National Forum for the Prevention of Child Labor (FNPETI) represents yet another part of the government's effort to combat child labor. Founded in November of 1994, the forum constructed in 1999 a National Network to Eradicate Child Labor, and individual forums within each of Brazil's 27 states. FNPETI is made up of these 27 bodies, plus 48 other entities that include commercial and business associations, trade unions, the ILO, the various bodies that enforce child labor statutes and prosecute child labor violations, and nongovernmental organizations that work to combat child labor.
FNPETI's accomplishments include the following:
• It has developed strategies for intervention in situations where child labor exists. First implemented to remove children from the dangerous and unhealthy work of producing charcoal in the state of Mato Grosso do Sul, forum practices have become the pattern for programs throughout the country. For example, Mato Grosso do Sul's extended day program has successfully kept children in school and involved in other activities, and away from producing charcoal.
• It assisted in the development of the government's Program for the Eradication of Child Labor (PETI).
• It lobbied successfully for Brazil's ratification of ILO Convention 138, concerning minimum working age, and Convention 182, concerning the worst forms of child labor.
• It drafted the "Parameters for the Formulation of a National Policy to Combat Child Labor," which became the basis for national policy.
• It participated in the creation of the National Plan for the Eradication of Child Labor and Protection of the Adolescent Worker as a founding member of the National Commission for the Eradication of Child Labor (CONAETI).
In September of 2002, the federal government issued a decree creating CONAETI. The organization's function is to ensure Brazil's compliance with ILO Conventions 138 and 182 and to develop a national plan for the eradication of child labor. The commission includes representatives of the relevant government ministries, the ILO and UNICEF, leading labor groups, and the leading industrial, commercial, and agricultural producers' associations. The commission had its first meeting in March 2003, and it has had regular meetings since then.
The commission drafted a far-reaching plan and is implementing it. The plan touches on all aspects of child labor, including health, combating the use of drugs, training, education, and public awareness. CONAETI has the wide-ranging membership needed to successfully implement these programs.
THE ILO ROLE
Partnering with various Brazilian agencies and NGOs, the International Labor Organization has been on the cutting edge of the effort to eliminate child labor in Brazil. During the 1990s, the ILO implemented various projects under the auspices of its International Program to Eliminate Child Labor (IPEC), many of which were funded by the U.S. Department of Labor.
The ILO program has included projects in Rio Grande do Sul to combat child labor in the shoe industry, the aforementioned efforts in Mato Grosso do Sul to take children out of charcoal production, and projects in various agricultural sectors.
In 2001, the ILO worked with the Brazilian Institute for Statistics and Geography to produce the first household survey of child labor in Brazil. Based on a survey of 100,000 households, this project utilized the ILO-developed methodology SIMPOC (Statistical Information and Monitoring Program on Child Labor) for measuring the extent of child labor.
In conjunction with this, the ILO partnered with Brazil's Ministry of Labor and others in a U.S. Department of Labor-funded program to reduce child labor in domestic work. This program has also been very successful in reducing the overall incidence of child labor in Brazil.
THE NGO ROLE
Many nongovernmental organizations have contributed to Brazil's success stories. ABRINQ Foundation, representing the toy manufacturers, has worked successfully to implement industry codes of conduct in various key Brazilian industries, including car manufacturing, steel, shoes, citrus, and sugar. A company that complies with the codes has the privilege of using the ABRINQ seal stating that no child labor was used in the making of its product.
ABRINQ has been particularly effective in encouraging Brazilian manufacturers to accept responsibility for their entire chain of production. Companies not only ensure that they use no child labor, but they require that their suppliers not use any either. The emphasis on voluntary compliance has worked well in convincing industries to police themselves.
One outstanding example of this is found in the town of Franca, in the northern part of the state of São Paulo. Franca has long been a center of Brazil's shoe manufacturing industry. Although the town's shoe factories, which have produced shoes for major American companies, employ no child labor, some of the parts suppliers for the shoes were using children to glue the parts. The shoe manufacturers mobilized the entire town and created a Pro-Child Institute, which sponsored extended programs to keep children out of work. Now, children in Franca not only attend school, but they benefit from various cultural, musical, and sports programs in the after-school hours.
In sum, although Brazil has not eradicated child labor, it has made significant progress in its battle to do so. Further, as a society, Brazil is committed to continuing to fight the battle.
From the May 2005 edition of eJournal USA
