BEIJING — Growing rural poverty and a declining education system for poor children may be worsening China’s child labor problem and forcing more youths to work before they are legally allowed, a labor-rights organization reported.
The China Labor Bulletin, based in Hong Kong, found that in several regions, illicit child labor appears to be rising. Although the study was not national in scope, “the assumption needs to be that this is a national problem and therefore deserving of attention from the national government,” said Robin Munro, research director for China Labor Bulletin.
China’s central government has not acknowledged that a child labor problem exists. National law requires that youths must be at least 16 years old to work full-time, and those under 18 are not allowed to work in hazardous occupations like mining. But the study and anecdotal evidence suggest that workers under 16 are increasingly common, especially in southern manufacturing areas.
Research from the China Labor Bulletin and other groups shows “the child labor phenomenon in China is worsening’’ every day, the report said.
The findings run counter to trends elsewhere. Last spring, the International Labor Organization reported an 11 percent drop in child labor worldwide. Yet as China’s rural-urban income gap widens and schooling opportunities lag for the poor, families are often allow children to drop out and go to work, the study concluded.
The problem, which is difficult to quantify for a lack of reliable government statistics, is a product of supply and demand.
“On the one hand, employers in the labor market seek opportunities to hire child labor in order to lower their costs,” the report said. “On the other hand, there are those under the legal age seeking work opportunities in the labor market, thereby creating a supply of child labor.”
The study paints a grim picture of underage workers, uninformed of their rights, who toil at the whim of profiteering companies. It describes cases of 14- and 15-year-olds working as much as 16 hours a day, sometimes earning half of what their adult counterparts are paid. Since the young workers typically have no labor contracts, their pay, living conditions and health are often controlled by employers.
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The garment industry is especially vulnerable to child labor, since most of the manual labor jobs in textiles and apparel require only basic skills and little education. The industry is also at risk because manufacturers use dozens of small subcontractors for supplies and these small, unmonitored factories are at high risk of using child labor.
“Labor inspectors and corporate social responsibility monitors will say they do quite often come across underage workers in the textile factories,” Munro said.
Avoiding the use of child labor can be a difficult prospect for companies that source in China. Complex manufacturing and supply chains mean the smallest factories, those most prone to hiring child workers, often remain unmonitored.
Munro said the only way to guarantee that products made in China are child-labor free was to establish on-the-ground factory monitoring that includes unannounced site visits and interviews with workers.