Labour Min­is­ter Stephen Mc Clashie says in Trinidad and To­ba­go, we still face chal­lenges with chil­dren in­volved in child labour.

In a mes­sage to com­mem­o­rate World Day Against Child Labour, Min­is­ter Mc Clashie said a Mul­ti­ple In­di­ca­tor Clus­ter Sur­vey (MICS) con­duct­ed by the Cen­tral Sta­tis­ti­cal Of­fice in col­lab­o­ra­tion with UNICEF in 2022 re­vealed that 4.3% of chil­dren be­tween the ages of 5 and 17 are in­volved in child labour.

He said that is, 4 out of every 100 chil­dren in that age group are in child labour.

"Child labour of­ten ex­pos­es chil­dren to haz­ardous con­di­tions, jeop­ar­diz­ing their health and safe­ty," he said.

The Min­ster said the MICS al­so re­vealed that 2.7% of chil­dren be­tween the ages of 5 and 17 are in­volved in haz­ardous child labour.

That is al­most 3 out of every 100 chil­dren in that age group are in haz­ardous child labour.

He said work oblig­a­tions hin­der chil­dren's ac­cess to ed­u­ca­tion, per­pet­u­at­ing cy­cles of pover­ty and lim­it­ing fu­ture op­por­tu­ni­ties.

Child labour of­ten sub­jects chil­dren to dan­ger­ous con­di­tions, ad­verse­ly af­fect­ing their phys­i­cal and men­tal health.

" Our goal is clear: to elim­i­nate all forms of child labour, in line with Sus­tain­able De­vel­op­ment Goal Tar­get 8.7 - To end all forms of child labour by 2025," he said.

Min­is­ter Mc Clashie said the Min­istry of Labour is col­lab­o­rat­ing with in­ter­na­tion­al or­ga­ni­za­tions, non-gov­ern­men­tal or­gan­i­sa­tions, and oth­er agen­cies to de­vel­op and im­ple­ment ef­fec­tive strate­gies to pre­vent and elim­i­nate child labour in Trinidad and To­ba­go.

He ex­plained that they are com­mit­ted to achiev­ing their goal and have launched sev­er­al ini­tia­tives.

"Re-es­tab­lish­ment of the Na­tion­al Steer­ing Com­mit­tee for the Pre­ven­tion and Elim­i­na­tion of Child Labour to over­see crit­i­cal ac­tiv­i­ties – 14 Gov­ern­ment agen­cies, 2 NGOs and Acad­e­mia work­ing to­geth­er.

En­gage­ment of the In­ter­na­tion­al Labour Or­ga­ni­za­tion to pro­vide tech­ni­cal sup­port to com­mence Stake­hold­er Con­sul­ta­tions to­wards the de­vel­op­ment of a Child Labour Pol­i­cy for Trinidad and To­ba­go.

Pro­duc­tion of a Child Labour ra­dio jin­gle De­vel­op­ment and Im­ple­men­ta­tion of a labour in­spec­tion sys­tem, through the ILO, to en­hance case man­age­ment. Train­ing for Labour In­spec­tors to boost ca­pac­i­ty in the de­tec­tion, in­ves­ti­ga­tion and pros­e­cu­tion," he added.

The Min­is­ter said the min­istry host­ed two (2) mul­ti­par­tite stake­hold­er con­sul­ta­tions on the in­tro­duc­tion of child labour and the de­vel­op­ment of haz­ardous child labour and light work lists to pro­tect chil­dren un­der the age of 18.

He added that there has been a com­mence­ment of the de­vel­op­ment of pro­to­cols for col­lab­o­ra­tion among agen­cies to en­sure a cross-sec­toral ap­proach to ad­dress­ing the is­sue, as well as on­go­ing col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Cen­tral Sta­tis­ti­cal Of­fice (CSO) for con­tin­u­ous col­lec­tion of da­ta on child labour.

There was al­so the launch of on­line and of­fline cam­paigns in schools and with­in com­mu­ni­ties and the ap­point­ment of 30 Child Labour Am­bas­sadors from sev­en (7) Schools.

The Min­is­ter in­di­cat­ed that there is now col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Min­istry of So­cial De­vel­op­ment to pro­vide eco­nom­ic sup­port and so­cial pro­tec­tion pro­grammes to help fam­i­lies keep their chil­dren in school rather than at work.

“I call up­on all stake­hold­ers—Gov­ern­ment, busi­ness­es, com­mu­ni­ties, and in­di­vid­u­als—to join forces with us in this crit­i­cal mis­sion. To­geth­er, we can en­sure that every child en­joys the child­hood they de­serve, with the op­por­tu­ni­ty to learn, grow, and thrive - free from the per­ils of Child Labour," Min­is­ter Mc Clashie said.