Child Labour Eradication policy hailed

Save the Children Sweden-Denmark (SCSD) and Together with Working Children (TWC), a platform of seven organisations working to ensure the rights of the children, yesterday hailed the government for approving the National Child Labour Eradication Policy 2010.
At a press conference at the Dhaka Reporters' Unity, the speakers of the organisations said the policy would certainly help eradicate child labour from the country gradually.
The main feature of the policy is that it includes a code of conduct for the employers of the child labourers, as it is not possible to stop child labour instantly.
The code of conduct involves working hours and the wage of the child labourers, education of these children, health and nutrition, working environment, entertainment, treatment, meeting with the families etc.
The policy tells of assigning the labour and employment ministry to monitor child labour-related issues. Formulation of a child labour unit is also suggested in the policy, they said.
Quoting the data of Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics 2002-03, the speakers said that there are 7.4 million child labourers in the country who earn a meager amount of money confronting different types of hazards.
The main objective of the policy is to eradicate children from all kinds of hazardous and worst forms of child labour. It also puts an end of confusion over the age for defining a child labourer and sets it according to Bangladesh Labour Law 2006.
"We hope the policy would bring benefit not only to the working children of Bangladesh but also be inspirational to other countries in the region where child labour is a burning issue," said Niels Bentzen, country representative of Save the Children Sweden Denmark.
Ratan Sarker, member of Together with Working Children, presented the keynote paper while Shamsul Alam, deputy country representative of Save the Children, moderated the press conference.