DOLE intensifies campaign on child labor-free barangay

LUCENA CITY, Quezon, Oct 3 (PIA) — The Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) has announced that President Aquino instructed several national line agencies to intensify the campaign on child labor-free barangay.

The said agencies are the following: of Department of Agriculture (DA), Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), Department of Education (DepEd) and the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG).

DOLE Undersecretary Lourdes Transmonte during her visit in this city said part of the program is barangay visitation to barangays with high cases of child labor.

In Quezon province, 18 barangays of the municipalities of Catanauan and Lopez in this city were identified by DOLE and International Labor Organization (ILO) as having high cases of child labor.

DOLE Provincial Director Virgilio Magsino said the identified 2,008 child laborers are now beneficiaries of the International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labor (IPEC), a project of ILO to eliminate child laboring in the province.

Seventy-two former child laborers in Barangay Dalahican in this city are now enrolled at Barangay Dalahican Elementary School and Dalahican National High School.

“We provide livelihood assistance to 27 parents of child laborers to support their children in sending them to school,” Magsino added.

Magsino said DOLE has implemented Child Labor Monitoring and Integrated Services and Delivery System (CLM-ISDS) program, where a multi-sectoral group has the main function of eliminating child labor.

Meanwhile, Quezon Gov. David Suarez strengthened the Provincial Council for the Protection of Child (PCPC) to achieve its goal of being a child labor-free province at 2020. (CPG/JMG,PIA-Quezon)