Child labor a 'multidimensional' problem

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Hendra, an 11-year-old street beggar and trash collector, stays silent and stares at the sky when asked whether he wants to continue his education.

He has given up on his dream of sitting in a classroom since his parents moved out of Jasinga in Bogor to Jakarta three years ago. The move forced him to quit after just two years of elementary school.

Now he spends his mornings helping his father collect garbage and his afternoons singing at an intersection in the Senayan area of Central Jakarta for small change.

Getting Hendra and 7 million other Indonesian child laborers back in school is more complex than simply providing enough chairs for them, according to a national seminar jointly organized by the International Labor Organization and the National Development Planning Board on Monday.

Hendra comes from a family of six, who are dependent on the extra Rp 30,000 (US$3.1) income he collects from handouts on the streets -- as is the case for most of the other Indonesian children who have been forced into work due to poverty.

The seminar on Monday was aimed at seeking guidelines for the implementation of a National Strategic Action Plan to eradicate the worst forms of child labor by 2009.

For the last few years, the government has planned a two- pronged program, which combines efforts to decrease the number of out-of-school children by providing transitional education grants and an informal education program with efforts to build capacity among poor families through job-training and capital provision.

In its latest survey, ILO found that one in five school-aged children from poor families had no access to education and experienced various kinds of exploitation at work -- both in the formal and informal sectors.

"Child labor is a multi-dimensional problem, which cannot be resolved solely by the education authorities," Irwanto, an expert on child labor explained.

He asserted that the form of education provided for child laborers must consider several factors.

"They lack nutrition, are already exhausted from work, lost what they learned previously and some do not see the importance of education," Irwanto said.

Therefore, he suggested that the format of education for the children be time-flexible, provide only the necessary life- skills, vocational and basic studies, and adopt a more experimental approach.

Irwanto pointed out several past failures where a large amount of donated money had been pumped into programs that were not sustainable.

"There were only 12 child laborers left in school at the end of the program, after it began with 70, because there was no cooperation with the parents, the employers or the children themselves," he said.

Ahmad Marzuki from the Child Labor Network (Jarak) said that forms of education for the children should be specified according to the characteristics of their work. The intervention method to approach the children should also differ from that targeting labor-prone children to actual child laborers.

"For those who are out of school and likely looking for work, we still can send them to school," he said. "But, a child working in a factory cannot be forced to take full-time classes."

Ahmad emphasized the need for an integrated intervention, which would include compulsory education, poverty eradication and social services.

Meanwhile, ILO country representative Alan Boulton said that a decrease in school fees would help bring the child laborers back to school.

"Most of them are at work because their parents could not afford to pay for their school fees," he said.

The Ministry of National Education has claimed that compulsory education is free of charge for children from poor families. However, the promised funding for schools to provide such free education will only be delivered in August at the earliest, while the new academic year will start in July. (003)