"child labour free" - what does it mean?
no child labour is used for cocos®- products!!!
we guarantee, that no children have to work to manufacture our products.
a large proportion of the products we offer are manufactured in asia - unfortunatelly, child labour is still a topic in some of the countries. all our manufacturers guaranteed us and documented, that no work for their production is carried out by children.
for these documentations, rainer schubert, manager of cocos ®-promotions gmbh, visits the production sites in far east repeatedly every year, unannounced, and also checks the situation of the workers.
we explain:
what is child labour?
child labour includes all children working under the age of 14 years. yet, a difference has to be made between exploitative child labour and child labour due to cultural reasons. according to the ILO (international labour organization), exploitative child labour is:
- slavery and debt bondage and all kinds of forced labour
- work of children under the age of 13 years
- child prostitution and child pornography
- children used as soldiers
- illegal work, like f.ex. smuggling drugs
- work, that endangers health, safety or morality, f.ex. working in stone pits, carrying heavy loads or long working hours and night-work
the situation today:
according to UNICEF, 190.7 million children between the ages of 5 and 14 are working today, with the majority working in the agricultural sector, in small workshops, are street vendors or housemaids.
a lot of child labour is found in asia, in the pacific area, and in africa south of the sahara:
- asia and pacific area: 122.3 million
- africa south of the sahara: 49.3 million
- latin america and caribbean: 5.7 million
- other regions: 13.4 million
in the 1989 UN convention on the rights of the child (UNCRC), the united nations assure the rights of children to be protected against commercial exploitation. 2002, with the first world day against child labour, an international commemoration day was established, that is now held annually on july 12th. since 2003, child trafficking (slavery) is increasingly pointed out during this commemoration day.
in some areas, f.ex. in the south of india, there is slowly another development regarding child labour. there are some unions for child labourers in the meantime; but their goal is not the abolition of child labour, but a "more human employment" (more limited work hours, no hinding of child labour anymore, health protection, a little better wages). stronger are organisations of children, who are working, in some latin american or african countries. they started to organise a worldwide children's movement and 2004, the first youth committee meeting took place in berlin.
in germany, child labour is defined in the young persons protection of employment act (JArbSchG): employment of children or young persons, that still go to school full-time, is not allowed, unless it is a legal exeption, f.ex. easy jobs for children of the age of 13 years and older. the employment of children for certain events can be authorised by the trade suvervisory centre. the employer then has to apply for an exception, before the work of the child(ren) starts, that can contain obligations, instructions and/or conditions.
fair trade takes products, for which child labour has been used, if fair trade himself has seen that the children, f. ex. regarding agriculture, have helped a little bit, without having been overburdened. (daily press)
