Tema Regional Director, Commission for Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ), Madam Fatima Mahani has called on the citizenry to put an end to child labour and allow the youth to enjoy their growth.
She said UNICEF data indicated that, all children in Ghana age five to 17 years, about 21 per cent were involved in child labour and 14 per cent were engaged in hazardous forms of labour.
This was twice as common in rural areas.
“For poorer households, child labour is a negative coping mechanism and most of the children are involved in agriculture and fishing industries.
“In all regions, the vast majority of working children are unpaid family workers between the ages of five and seven years,” Madam Mahami stated this during the launch of this year’s World Day Against Child Labour.
Social norms also sought to promote the view that many adolescent children should be treated as adults, while poorly enforced legislation and policies to prohibit child labour are impeding the work of advocates against child labour.
Tema Regional Director (CHRAJ) , also expressed concern about insufficient allocation of resources for the prevention of and response to child labour, inadequate services to support working children or prevent child labour and family reliance on income generated by children due to extreme poverty.
Mr John Ato Brebor, Senior Principal Investigator at CHRAJ contributing to the discussion said, the government needed to review the social protection policy that would alleviate poverty and encourage long-term human capital development since the major cause of child labour was poverty.
