Synthesis Essay On Child Labor

In 2008, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) estimated that nearly 158 million children worldwide from ages as young as five to the late teens are engaged in child labor (Source 1). Child labor can be described as work that is often considered illegal, hazardous, or extremely exploitative to children or keeps them from attending school (Source 2). Everyday, children are assigned demanding and dangerous positions that are extremely cruel. Such positions range from a wide variety of occupations from industrial to agricultural to even as horrifying as employment in the military as child soldiers. Despite attempts at the extermination of child labor, it still manages to remain one of the most expansive and cruel human rights violations

Children are particularly vulnerable to these chemicals due to their smaller size and lower resistance to them. Another instance in which children are at risk for poisoning is when eating harvested foods. Normally, there are standards in place on how much particle residue is allowed to be on food that is to be sold to the public, but unfortunately, these same regulations cannot be enforced on child laborers (Source 3). One agricultural business that runs rampant with child labor, is the flower industry. Ecuador, the world’s largest supplier of freshly cut flowers, is also one of the greatest offender of child labor laws. Nearly two-thirds of flower workers in the country of Ecuador suffer from work-related health problems that include symptoms such as nausea or impaired vision, but sometimes these conditions can be far more severe, causing asthma, birth defects, or even miscarriages. Speaking of pregnancy related issues, young women in Ecuador, who make up half of the country's flower workforce, often face abusive conditions at plantations. These “women” are often as young as eleven years old, but still work full time at the plantations. The International Labor Rights Forum conducted a series of interviews in 2005, that revealed that “Women [make up] half of the country's flower workforce… 55 percent

In 1989, the U.N. General Assembly created a bill known as the Convention on the Rights of the Child. An excerpt from Article 23 of this document explains that “The child has the right to be protected from work that threatens his or her health, education or development. The State shall set minimum ages for employment and shall regulate working conditions.” In a report conducted in 1997, which focused on child labor, UNICEF condemned child labor as “one of the worst abuses of children’s rights” and emphasizes the importance of schooling as a key tool in eliminating child labor. UNICEF argues that “the single most effective way to stem the flow of school age children into abusive forms of employment or work is to extend and improve education so that it will attract and retain them… primary education must be made universal and compulsory.” UNICEF believes that by teaching truly useful skills through education is key to challenging poverty, which must be eradicated before child labor can be stopped (Source 1). Nonetheless, this has not happened yet. Child labor numbers are down from what they were in the past, but the problem is far from