Selected Child Labor Measures Adopted by Governments
| Ratified Convention 138 (12/16/1998) |
X |
| Ratified Convention 182 (09/12/2001) |
X |
| ILO-IPEC Member |
X |
| National Plan for Children |
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| National Child Labor Action Plan |
X |
| Sector Action Plan |
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Incidence and Nature of Child Labor
The Tanzanian National Bureau of Statistics estimated that 35.4 percent of children ages 5 to 14 years in Tanzania were working in 2000-2001.[3823] The survey found that majority of working children were unpaid family workers who engaged in agricultural and non-agricultural work on family farms. An estimated 77.4 percent of children ages 5 to 14 work in the agricultural, forestry, and fishing sectors, while 49.9 percent of children ages 5 to 14 engage in housekeeping activities.[3824] The survey found that 55.7 percent of working children ages 5 to 14 years attended school.[3825]
Children work on commercial tea,[3826] coffee,[3827] sugar cane,[3828] sisal, cloves,[3829] and tobacco farms,[3830] and in the production of wheat and corn.[3831] Children also work in underground mines and near mines in bars and restaurants.[3832]
In the informal sector, children are engaged in scavenging, fishing, fish processing, and quarrying.[3833] Other children work as barmaids, street vendors, car washers, shoe shiners, cart pushers, carpenters, auto repair mechanics, and in garages.[3834] Children also work in paid domestic service.[3835]
Girls as young as 7 years, and increasingly boys, are reportedly victims of commercial sexual exploitation.[3836] According to an ILO study, children have been exploited in the production of pornographic films.[3837] Children from Kenya, Uganda, and Rwanda also engage in prostitution in Tanzania.[3838] Children are reportedly trafficked internally to work in the fishing industry, mines, commercial agriculture, and domestic service.[3839] Children are trafficked from rural areas for exploitation in the commercial sex sector.[3840] It is reported that girls are trafficked from Tanzania to South Africa, the Middle East, and Europe for the purpose of commercial sexual exploitation. Children are also trafficked from Tanzania for the purpose of forced labor. Children are reportedly trafficked into Tanzania from India, Kenya, Burundi, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo to work in forced agricultural labor and prostitution.[3841]
Education in Tanzania is compulsory for 7 years, until children reach the age of 15 years.[3842] In 2001, the gross primary enrollment rate was 70 percent, and the net primary enrollment rate was 54.4 percent.[3843] Gross and net enrollment ratios are based on the number of students formally registered in primary school and therefore do not necessarily reflect actual school attendance. In 2001, 56.9 percent of children aged 5 to 17 years attended school.[3844] The Tanzanian Parliament voted in 2002 to drop primary school fees, but a lack of resources for additional teachers, classrooms, books, or uniforms, led to primary schools becoming overwhelmed by the massive increase in children seeking to take advantage of free primary education.[3845] Moreover, families must pay for enrollment fees, books, and uniforms. In contrast to mainland Tanzania, tuition also must be paid on Zanzibar.[3846]
Child Labor Laws and Enforcement
The Employment Ordinance of 1955 prohibits employment of children under the “apparent” age of 12 years. This ordinance also prohibits children under the age of 15 years and young people under the age of 18 years from employment in any work that could be injurious to health, dangerous or otherwise unsuitable. It prohibits children under the age of 15 years from working near machinery, and young people under the apparent age of 18 years from engaging in underground work. Children under the “apparent” age of 18 years are prohibited from working between the hours of 6 p.m. and 6 am. The law does not restrict children from family work or light agriculture work that has been approved by the proper authority.[3847] Under the Employment Ordinance, employers are obliged to maintain registers listing the age of workers, working conditions, the nature of employment, and commencement and termination dates.[3848] In Zanzibar, the law prohibits employment of children under the age of 18 years depending on the nature of the work.[3849]
Tanzania’s Constitution prohibits forced or compulsory labor.[3850] Tanzanian law considers sexual intercourse with a child under the age of 18 years to be rape, which is punishable with life imprisonment. Tanzanian law prohibits the procuring of a child under the age of 18 for the purpose of sexual intercourse or indecent exhibition. The law further prohibits the procurement or attempted procurement of a person under the age of 18 years for the purpose of prohibited sexual intercourse either inside or outside the country.[3851] In 2001, the Tanzanian Penal Code was amended to include a provision criminalizing trafficking of persons within or outside Tanzania.[3852]
Several government agencies have jurisdiction over areas related to child labor, but primary responsibility for enforcing the country’s child labor laws rests with the Ministry of Labor, Youth Development and Sports. The ministry’s Child Labor Unit works together with other government ministries and networking with other stakeholders. It gathers, analyzes, and disseminates child labor related data, and is involved in training and sensitizing labor inspectors on child labor issues. The Child Labor Unit also acts as the secretariat for the National Child Labor Elimination Steering Committee (NCLESC). The NCLESC is responsible for defining objectives and priorities for child labor interventions, approving and overseeing implementation of child labor action projects, and advising the government on various child labor issues.[3853] At the community level, child labor monitoring committees have been established in areas with a high incidence of child labor. [3854] The Ministry of Labor, Youth Development and Sports, however, lacks sufficient inspectors to monitor for child labor violations.[3855]
Current Government Policies and Programs to Eliminate the Worst Forms of Child Labor
The Government of Tanzania is working with ILO-IPEC to implement a Timebound Program (TBP) to eliminate the worst forms of child labor in the country by 2010, including child labor in commercial agriculture, domestic service, mining, and commercial sexual exploitation of children.[3856] The Child Labor Unit of the Ministry of Labor, Youth Development and Sports is working with ILO-IPEC under the TBP to provide training for district child labor coordinators and district officials in the TBP’s 11 target districts, to increase their capacity to combat the worst forms of child labor.[3857] In 2004, the Department of Information Services conducted 11 orientation workshops to raise awareness among communities and the media about the worst forms of child labor.[3858] As part of the TBP, the Ministry of Education’s Complementary Basic Education in Tanzania (COBET) Program its Vocational Education Training Authority (VETA) are providing basic education and vocational training to children withdrawn or prevented from involvement in the worst forms of child labor in the TBP’s 11 target districts.[3859]
In addition, the Government of Japan, through UNICEF, is supporting a basic education project targeting out-of-school children in Tanzania that will provide text books, reading materials on HIV/AIDS, and community workshops on HIV/AIDS with support from COBET.[3860] Tanzania is also working with four other countries participating in an ILO-IPEC program, funded by USDOL, to remove children from exploitative work in commercial agriculture.[3861]
In March 2004, the Tanzanian Ministry of Education and Culture signed an MOU with the NGO Education Development Center (EDC) stipulating areas of collaboration, roles, and responsibilities in support of the education component of the Tanzania TBP. The EDC project seeks to ensure that children engaged in or at risk of engaging in the worst forms of child labor have access to basic, quality education, as a means of helping to eliminate the worst forms of child labor.[3862]
The Government of Tanzania’s Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper includes the elimination of child labor as an objective and the preparation of a child labor action plan in its workplan.[3863] The strategy paper established the Poverty Monitoring Master Plan (PMMP), which includes children in the labor force as a poverty monitoring indicator.[3864] An Education Fund to support children from poor families is called for within the PMMP strategy paper.[3865] Tanzania’s Development Vision 2025 and its Poverty Eradication Strategy 2015 both identify education as a strategy for combating poverty. The country’s poverty eradication agenda includes ensuring all children the right to basic quality education.[3866]
The government’s Basic Education Master Plan aims to achieve universal access to basic education for children over the age of 7 years, and ensure that at least 80 percent of children complete primary education and are able to read and write by the age of 15 years.[3867] The government is implementing a 5-year Primary Education Development Plan (PEDP), begun in 2002, which aims to expand enrollment, improve the quality of teaching, and build capacity within the country’s educational system. Under the PEDP, the government has committed up to 25 percent of its overall recurrent expenditures on the education sector, with 62 percent to be allocated to primary education.[3868] The government abolished school fees to promote children’s enrollment in primary school under the PEDP.[3869]
The Government of Tanzania receives funding from the World Bank and other donors under the Education for All Fast Track Initiative, which aims to provide all children with a primary school education by the year 2015.[3870]
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