Child Labour and Social Responsibilities

Source: Child labour in Nepal _ Two Nepalese children scavenge wood … _ Flickr

The origins of child labour as a practice are blurry. It most probably started during the age of Industrialisation. But even before this, the concept of living a happy childhood without worrying about one’s livelihood wasn’t very well adopted. In many communities, children used to grow up working and participating in household activities. The tasks they performed were more or less the same amount of work adults were involved in.

This directly translates to shorter life expectancy which wasn’t helped much after the beginning of the industrial age. Children kept on working and their living conditions kept on deteriorating. This prevails till date. Many kids are forced into this deadly cycle each and every minute.

The social responsibility of a company

One might wonder- what does a company have to do with child labour? Or maybe they won’t. It is no news that companies exploit a great deal of their workers if they have to. There is, however, a limit to what they can do. Their Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) compels them to think about their responsibility to society, their stakeholders, and the public. They have to take care of what their actions would do to these three agents. This is the reason why they can’t endlessly violate rights and social agreements as much as they would normally.

Their actions have to be ethically, environmentally, financially, and philanthropically responsible and studies show that it is immensely beneficial for companies and consumers alike. Consumers tend to act more favourably towards companies which act equally well with consumers. Companies benefit because their workers appreciate the good working conditions and don’t leave their jobs. A real-life example is that of the company, Starbucks which predicts that they will achieve 50% reductions in greenhouse gas emissions by 2030.

Child Labour and our society

Source: https://www.flickr.com/photos/iloasiapacific/35887665771

Loopholes can be found in the strongest of arguments and negatives can be hidden if it is planned well enough. This is exactly what happens in the case of child labour and companies which employ kids.

Many companies are able to hide and reap benefits from child labour present in their framework. This practice goes undetected during the certification process of a product. This happens during this process because the certification agencies most often do not modify their audit processes or train their auditors enough to identify such issues. The problem goes undetected. But it also helps us think of one way out- if someone fixes the certification process, won’t the rate of detection of child labour in the production process also increase significantly?

Real-life situations

The world currently has 168 million children employed as wage workers and many of them are in supply chains in the private sector. As a response, the International Organisation of Labour was made with the objective of respecting and protecting children’s right to be free from doing labour of any sort. Multiple case studies and projects have been undertaken to understand this issue from its roots.

Vanessa Phala is the ILO country director for Ghana, Liaison office for ECOWAS, Sierra Leone and Nigeria and states that many human communities across Africa suffer because of this practice. The recent Nigeria Chila Labour Survey of 2022 showed how child labour victims are not able to go to school which ruins their chances of happy and healthy living. The situation is the same for both male and female children, and employment has been found to be the worst kind of effect on their schooling. Children from either or both rural and poor households are more prone to becoming a victim of this evil.

Chocolate production in Ghana and Ivory Coast involves Child Labour too. Many multinational food businesses who have their chains here have been criticised for their involvement. Nestle also faced criticism for being complicit in using forced child labour and is now planning to spend some 1.4 billion dollars to tackle poverty, which will, in turn, solve child labour.

A similar case was found in Egypt where very small children were found working in extremely unsafe conditions in jasmine perfume factories. Another instance is that of a company director from Chemor, Malaysia, who was arrested in July 2024 as a suspect for his involvement in human trafficking and exploitation of child labour.

Do we have a solution?

There are some solutions offered by experts on this matter. Using CSR reviews seems like a good option. Companies that adopt appropriate human rights principles in their managerial behaviour are better adherents of CSR but the rest, that don’t understand their responsibilities, will come under the radar of such reviews.

If a company becomes a part of the cycle, then, their reputation and brand image will suffer. This will result in the loss of shares, filing of lawsuits, and boycotting of services. This will invite future negatives too. The company might suffer from a decrease in recruitment of staff, investment, new opportunities, and more. CSR reviews can instil such fear in corporates and prevent future investments in child labour.

Secondly, ILO offers a guidance tool to combat this problem in their framework. There are three parts to this guidance:

The first section is all about basic information and standards set by organizations against this practice.
The second section guides them in developing a proper approach to fight this issue.
And the third section contains more information on international standards and various resources.

All in all, every expert advice companies to place importance on the development of holistic and appropriate approaches to solve this problem. The key is to conduct their businesses responsibly. If child labour does exist or make its way into their business, they should look for the root cause and work to finish it.

Resources

The social responsibility of a company