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Technical Cooperation Project Summary

Project Title

Support for the Implementation of the Senegal Timebound Program

Region/Country

AFRICA/Senegal

Project Duration

September 30, 2003 – December 31, 2007

Fiscal Year & Funding Level

FY 2003: USD 2,000,000

Problem to be Addressed

In 2001, the ILO estimated that 26.5 percent of children ages 10 to 14 years in Senegal were working. Children can be found working on rural family farms, and in fishing, gold and salt mining, stone quarries, and small businesses, and many Koranic students are involved in organized street begging. Children are also reported to be working in domestic service, public transportation, and dump sites, and subject to sexual exploitation. Senegal is also a source, transit, and destination country for the trafficking of women and girls.

Results

Under the project, 2,969 children were withdrawn and 6,208 children prevented from involvement in child labor in agriculture, fishing, and domestic work through educational and/or training services.

Project Objectives

To contribute to the elimination of the worst forms of child labor and the creation of a strong social foundation for eliminating all forms of child labor in Senegal.

Intermediate objectives include:

  • Enhance national capacity to combat the worst forms of child labor;
  • Promote harmonization and respect for the legal framework against child labor;
  • Increase awareness of the worst forms of child labor in Senegal;
  • Implement effective strategies against the exploitation of children through begging; and
  • Withdraw children from hazardous work and prevented children from entering exploitive child labor in domestic work, fishing and agriculture.

The project also aims to improve the capacity of the country’s education system to serve working children and to act as a tool to combat child labor; and to improve the knowledge base of the problem. Both of these components are funded by the Government of France.

Summary of Activities
  • Supported the continual integration of child labor issues into the country’s poverty reduction strategies;
  • Provided support for the establishment of an inter-agency national committee to combat child labor;
  • Trained the Ministry of Labor Child Labor Unit in child labor monitoring and record keeping;
  • Supported the formulation, implementation and enforcement of policies and legislation in line with ILO Convention No. 182;
  • Raised awareness at a national and local level through social mobilization campaigns, media presentations, and activities that directly empower children and families;
  • Worked with local groups to develop strategies to assist children involved in begging; and
  • Provided alternatives to child labor, including formal, non-formal or transitional education and vocational training, through direct action interventions for children engaged in the worst forms of child labor.
  • In addition, to achieve the project objectives funded by the Government of France, the formal education system commenced reforms to adapt to the needs of working children, promoted increased vocational technical training for adolescents, and assisted in the execution of a national child labor survey.

Grantee

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

Implementing partners

APROFES; Alliance for the Solidarity and Mutual Assistance of Mboro; Caritas Clairenfance; Centre Emmanuel; Coordination Unit for Prevention of Child Labour; ENDA GRAF; Ndèyi Jirim; and Plan Thiès.

Contact Information

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

(202) 693-4843