New DOLE and ILO-IPEC project seeks to reduce child labor by 75%
Labor and Employment Secretary Rosalinda D. Baldoz yesterday announced that the Department of Labor and Employment and the International Labor Organization-International Program for the Elimination of Child Labor (ILO-IPEC) are teaming up anew in a new project that seeks to reduce the worst forms of child labor by as much as 75%.
“From 2005 to 2008, the Gender Statistics on Labor and Employment posted a 7% downward trend in the number of children 5-17 years old who are economically active. But while the GSLE generates data on working children, there still seems to be a dearth in data on children who are in the worst forms of child labor,” Baldoz said, adding:
“This concern of the Philippine Program Against Child Labor will now be responded to with the conduct of a special survey on children, a new project of the DOLE and the ILO-IPEC.”
The new project entitled Strengthening National Capacities to Support the Philippine Program Against Child Labor’s Vision of a Child Labor-Free Philippines aims to contribute to the PPACL goal to reduce the incidence of the worst forms of child labor (WFCL) by 75%.
It has four components: a) Knowledge Management; b) Effective Partnership; c) Area- Based Services in the provinces of Quezon, Masbate, Northern Samar and Bukidnon); and d) Sustainability.
The PPACL partners and the ILO-IPEC identified the four provinces based on the same GSLE data which shows a concentration of working children in the mentioned four provinces.
Further determination of the specific areas in these provinces will be undertaken by the ILO-IPEC in coordination with the Regional Child Labor Committees headed by the DOLE Regional Directors of Regions 4-A, 5, 8 and 10.
The component of Knowledge Management will work towards providing information on child labor which feeds into national and local child labor policy and program design, implementation and evaluation. Under this component is the survey on working children, which is to be undertaken in coordination with the National Statistics Office, a program partner of the PPACL.
“Initial discussion on the survey is now underway. The DOLE’s Bureau of Labor and Employment Statistics has been involved earlier on to ensure the capture of updated WFCL data and not merely those on working children,” said Director Chit Cilindro of the DOLE’s Bureau of Workers with Special Concerns.
The BWSC acts as secretariat of the PPACL. It also provides technical supervision in the conduct of all activities against child labor nationwide.
For its contribution to the PPACL, the DOLE implements its Child Labor Prevention and Elimination Program (CLPEP).
Secretary Baldoz believes that continuing DOLE partnership with ILO-IPEC, UNICEF, and other international organizations providing developmental assistance to the PPACL will greatly help attain the country’s goal of eliminating the worst forms of child labor in 2016.