CAUSES OF CHILD LABOUR IN
BANGLADESH AND ITS EFFECT ON THE FUTURE OF THE COUNTRY
Child labour is a widely accepted and a very common occurrence
in Bangladesh, although outlawed. There are more than 7.9 million child labours
overall in the country, with the number still rising. This was told after the
child labour survey in 2002 and 2003 by the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics. However,
the government continues to work against it with the labour act in 2006 which
included a page on child labour. Along with the act the government had put into
force a national educational policy where education is free and it is
compulsory for every child to obtain education till grade 8. In Bangladesh the
main sectors which have child labour are: agriculture, industrial, street hawkers,
construction sections and vehicles as conductors, in workshops etcetera. In the agricultural sector it is not only the
hardships of farming which drain over them but also the manufacturing of
pesticides and other chemicals used in the agricultural industry with which
they have direct contact thus affecting their health. 65% of these labours have
jobs which lead them to work for 9-14 hours a day on an average.
There
have been a large number of effects of child labour in the country which ranges
from the ones currently in poverty continuing to do so and that doesn’t solve
the problem but only makes it worse. Apart from the rural areas there has been
a huge report of child labour from urban areas as well. These causes can even
lead to early deaths (adolescent mortality) and further diseases which would
prevail in children through their lives. The future growth of the country is
largely stunted because a big number of its population has grown out of
illiteracy due to child labour. This has been proven by a survey which showed
the drop in school attendance. Illiteracy in children later leads to illiteracy
in the next generation because studies have proven that parental education
shows curtailment of child labour, thereby stopping the trade-off between
schooling and child labour.
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