I think the prevalence of child labour is because of many complex difficult situations that children, especially from poor countries find themselves in. Poverty forces children out of their homes and oftentimes, out of school and into work. Opportunistic employers are only happy to utilize the cheap and easy to use labour. In poor countries, parents have to decide between getting their children educated or them contributing to the family income. Obviously, the latter is often chosen. Clearly, the issue of child labour is not as clear-cut as it seems to be, it is part of the complex, vicious system of poverty, a system that should be tackled at its very roots, its roots being when it is most prevalent - amongst the families. Tackling poverty at family level is a sure way to reduce it, and eradicate such ills as child labour. Issues such as child labour are just but results of poverty. “Don’t tackle the result; tackle the cause of the result.”
Knowing that some of the food we consume is produced using child labour, knowing that children are contributing to their family incomes, paying child labour fairly, making children work in shifts between school and work or improving working conditions of child labour just does not make the problem any better. Such mentalities are deceitful and simply smokescreen poverty. Solving the roots of the problem and not the results is the best way to move forward.
Children are not meant to work. They are supposed to grow, get educated, become adults and then properly move into the working world. Those who exploit the vulnerability, deprivation and immaturity of the world’s children have no place in our society. They certainly have no respect whatsoever of the future generations and deserve to be sternly condoned by the law and such immorality brought to a halt.
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