The Labour, Human Services and Social Security and Education ministries and the European Union last week launched TACKLE, a public education programme aimed at boosting school attendance in observance of World Day Against Child Labour.
According to a Government Information Agency (GINA) press release TACKLE – Tackling Child Labour Through Education is also part of a series of activities the agencies are collaborating on for the occasion.
Labour Minister Manzoor Nadir said Guyana is a signatory to 182 and 138 of the International Labour Organisation Convention that deals with child labour. He also said in 1994 the minimum age for entry into the work force was raised to 15 to harmonise the age of leaving school with the age of entry into the workforce. “We have maintained in Guyana that we want to ensure that people do not confuse child labour with child work,” Nadir added, explaining that the Employment of Young Persons Act, permits children to do chores in their family business providing that is does not in any way, hinder their access to an education.
“Anytime you are going to hire a child under 15 and paying them wages, you are engaging in child labour,” he explained. The minister posited that all the studies carried out in Guyana thus far have proven that child labour is not prevalent; however, “the level of truancy remains relatively high.”
Additionally, Minister of Education Shaik Baksh said the public education programme is more of a preventative technique as it aims at raising awareness about the importance of keeping children in school so that they can complete their education. He said too government is committed to providing learning institutions with the necessary resources however, he acknowledged that as children get older their parents often send them off to seek employment, particularly in rural communities.
Baksh also said his ministry has designed several remedial programmes for low performers which will be offered over the July-August period.
The programme aims at ensuring that children at every level are competent enough to move on to the next class level. “Strong remediation is important because we feel as long as a child is literate and numerate, the chances of that child dropping out of school” are less, he said. The minister also said from September a new system will be implemented to ensure that there is no repeating as in the primary school system.
Baksh said too the structure of the school system needs to be changed from an authoritative to a more child-friendly environment.
According to GINA, the acting fraternity attended the launching to help convey the message through ‘edutainment’. Representatives from the Guyana Trades Union Congress and the Federation of Independent Trade Unions of Guyana also attended. Two posters inscribed with messages to fight child labour were also presented.
