The full-time employment of children, especially those who are legally too young to work is known as child labour.
This practice, according to the International Labour Organisation (ILO), is highly prevalent in Africa and other third world countries.
Over the past years, non-governmental organisations, civil society organisations, government institutions and other organizations have waged vigorous campaigns against the use of children for cheap labour.
It is in this wise that the ministry of employment and social welfare has rolled out a national plan of action to eliminate child labour in cocoa growing areas of the country.
The main objective of the project is to identify the contribution it can make to the adoption and mainstreaming of the National Plan of Action (NPA).
Deputy Minister for the sector, Mr Antwi Boasiako-Sekyere, made this known in Accra when he addressed participants at the launch of a stakeholder’s consultation on the ILO and International Programme on Elimination of Child labour (IPEC) project on eliminating worst forms of child labour in West Africa.
According to the minister, Ghana’s child labour survey had revealed that 6.4 million children between the ages of 5 and 17 were active, with 20% of them engaged in activities that could be classified as child labour.
This indicates that the fight against the canker seems to be far from over since we have a lot more children illegally working for people across the length and breadth of the country.
It is refreshing that efforts are being made to curtail child labour looking at the fact that ILO in its 10th year have played a pivotal role in the anti-child labour campaign ever since ILO Convention 182 on the elimination of the worst forms of child labour was launched.
While commending efforts of the ministry of employment and social welfare, the ILO and major stakeholders committed to the cause of eliminating child labour, Today thinks that the NPA on child labour should not be only limited in scope to cocoa growing areas.
It is very worrying to see a lot of children at various canoe landing and fishing sites also engaging themselves in several fishing activities.
We at Today recommend that the action plan cover non-cocoa growing communities too like the fishing and coastal areas where parents usually compel children to quit schooling and join them for fishing.
Today thinks that children should not be allowed to engage in activities of this nature since it can ruin their educational aspirations and academic achievements in life.