ILO takes keen interest in child labor in 4 provinces

TACLOBAN CITY—The International Labor Organization (ILO) is taking a close look at the plight of thousands of working children in four provinces in a continuing program to end child labor in the Philippines.

The ILO is implementing the second phase of the program in Northern Samar, Masbate, Bukidnon and Quezon, according to Jess Macasil, senior program officer of the ILO’s Philippine country office.

The four provinces were chosen based on the 2001 child labor survey and other data like dropout rate, poverty incidence, number of poor families and results of a survey on population and family income, Macasil said on Wednesday.

The Child Labor Act prohibits the use of children below 18 years old for slavery, armed conflicts, prostitution, pornography, drug trafficking and work hazardous to health.

Macasil said the ILO has been helping member-states, like the Philippines, enforce ILO Convention 182, an international convention against the worst forms of child labor.

“This problem … cannot be solved by education alone,” Macasil said.

He said that the ongoing program in the four provinces seeks to send children to school to pull them out of work.

Macasil, however, said ILO was working on the basis of outdated data.

He said the latest survey on child workers was made in 2001 and showed 4.18 million children engaged in various forms of work mostly in Bicol, Central Visayas, Eastern Visayas and Western Visayas.

ILO, he said, has implemented the first phase of the program to eliminate child labor in these areas, except Eastern Visayas. –Vicente Labro, Philippine Daily Inquirer