KARACHI:
Child exploitation is the use of children for someone else’s advantage. It often results in the unjust, cruel, and harmful treatment of children. These activities have a detrimental impact on the child’s physical and mental health as well as education, moral, and social development. The World Bank estimated that poverty in Pakistan rose from 4.4% to 5.4% in 2020. Poverty prevents the children from going to school in turn forcing parents to send their children to work. Due to this, a huge number of children remain out of school. A recent Unicef report has revealed that Pakistan has an estimated 22.8 million children out of school.
To eliminate child exploitation, the country has introduced, several laws prohibiting child labour, or regulating the working conditions of child workers. The government also ratified ILO’s core conventions related to child labour: Minimum Age Convention, 1973 (No. 138); Worst Form of Child Labour Convention, 1999 (No. 182). Despite the existence of several laws, there is a lack of implementation and regulation. I request the government to pay attention to child exploitation and ensure proper measures for the implementation laws related to child labour.
Asif Ali Korai
Pano Aqil
Published in The Express Tribune, August 22nd, 2021.
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