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Technical Cooperation Project Summary

Project Title

Converging Against Child Labor: Support for India’s Model

Region/Country

ASIA/India

Project Duration

September 30, 2008 – March 31, 2012

Fiscal Year & Funding Level

FY 2008: USD 6,850,000

Problem to be Addressed

According to the 1991 census, 11.3 million Indian children ages 5 to 14 are working out of a total child population of 210 million.  Unofficial estimates place the number much higher, given that many children work in the vast informal and unregulated sectors of the economy.  In hazardous industries, children typically work very long hours for little or no pay, do not have access to schooling, are subject to verbal or physical abuse and are exposed to various risks, including dangerous chemicals, sharp-edged equipment, heavy loads, open flames, dust, and other unsafe substances and situations.

Targets

The project targets 9,700 children for withdrawal and 9,300 children for prevention from hazardous child labor.  Approximately 385 of these children will be identified based on their status of having been trafficked or vulnerable to being trafficked for exploitive labor.  The project utilizes an ‘area-based’ approach to identify target children and will document the many exploitive sectors in which children are engaged in each targeted district as the information becomes available.  Target geographic areas include 10 districts in the states of Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Bihar, Orissa, and Jarkhand.

Project Objectives

Contribute to the prevention and elimination of hazardous child labor by converging the resources of the country’s major educational and poverty alleviation programs together to combat child labor (The Convergence Model). 

Intermediate objectives include:

  • Demonstrate an effective convergence-based model for the prevention and elimination of child labor in two districts in each of the targeted five states; 
  • Enhance state-level capacities to coordinate action against child labor and support convergence interventions at the district level;
  • Create a strengthened enabling environment for the prevention and elimination of child labor at the national level to take convergence to scale; and
  • Increase the capacity of workers and employers organizations to actively participate and promote the convergence model at district, state, and national levels.

Summary of Activities
  • Define, strengthen, or establish coordination structures and implementation mechanisms for convergence;
  • Provide increased access to formal education support services, non-formal education, job skills training and employment links to withdraw or prevent 19,000 children from hazardous labor;
  • Develop innovative alternatives to production processes involving children under hazardous conditions;
  • Increase economic security for families who withdraw their children from hazardous work;
  • Raise awareness and strengthen the capacity of national, state, district, and local institutions to eliminate hazardous child labor;
  • Strengthen the labor enforcement system;
  • Form local trade union and employer organization networks in support of the convergence model; and
  • Conduct targeted research to expand the knowledge base on key issues related to child labor in India.

 

Grantee

International Labor Organization’s International Program on the Elimination of Child Labor (ILO-IPEC)

 

Implementing Partners

Ministries of Labor and Employment; NGOs and civil society groups. 

Contact Information

Office of Child Labor, Forced Labor, and Human Trafficking (OCFT)

(202) 693-4843