These quotes and images will help you understand how unfair child labor is, and the hardships that families go through. Children should be worrying about which toy to play with next, not how much money you need to save to feed your family the next meal. Children are powerless because they are forced to support their financially-unstable families, and their voices are consistently unheard. These quotes and images represent the unheard voices of working children and how ignored their rights and opinions are.
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"My father has been out of work for years now. I'm the only breadwinner. One of my younger brothers quit school a year ago to work but he is doing nothing because there aren't any jobs in Gaza. I make 70 shekels a week (£12; $18) and give all the money I make to my father. He gives me 10 shekels a week, which isn't even enough to pay my transport to and from work each day."
--Raed Ahmed Moussa, 14, mechanic |
"I was never a good student and I know I'm not going to be a doctor or a teacher, so I decided to quit because I'm convinced it's a waste of time. But that's not the only reason - my dad is unemployed and I have nine brothers and sisters who badly need food and money for school. Honestly, I'm fed up with my life. I have been coming to the landfill for three years now. I search all day through rubbish bags for plastic, copper and aluminium. Anything I find, I sell to a man here who collects the scrap for the factories - I'm sure he rips us off."
--Moussa Suhail Obeid, 13, rubbish collector
--Moussa Suhail Obeid, 13, rubbish collector
"God forgive those who are forcing me to ask my son to work at such an early age," says Saleh al-Dama, who has 10 children between the ages of 18 and one-and-a-half. Several international NGOs have given me food supplies like cooking oil, flour, rice and beans. We depend on this to survive. see the markets have all kinds fruits, food and clothes, but I can buy nothing for my children because my pocket are empty."
--Saleh al-Dama, father of 10 children, rubble collector
--Saleh al-Dama, father of 10 children, rubble collector
"I have been working at this crossroad for four years now. My young sister Alaa has worked here since she was four years old. I started working with my mother who also works here as a street seller. We were young and she couldn't leave us home alone, so she decided to take us with her."
--Sobhiya Bassal, nine, street peddler
--Sobhiya Bassal, nine, street peddler
“My biggest fear is I won’t have work. If I’m sick or something, I can’t support my family, my parents, or myself.”
--Abed Al Allah, 13, cucumber picker
--Abed Al Allah, 13, cucumber picker
"I decided to leave school, we didn’t have money to buy bread."
--Omar Khaled, 11, child laborer
--Omar Khaled, 11, child laborer
"I want to be a doctor or a teacher, but I feel like in my life I’m just going to pick oranges. I’m not going to get any further."
--Hamzi El Hassan, 13, fruit and vegetable picker
--Hamzi El Hassan, 13, fruit and vegetable picker
“My dad says, ‘Don’t come home until you sold them all,’” he tells me.
--Bekir Belo, 7, flower seller
--Bekir Belo, 7, flower seller
“I work to support my family, my dad doesn’t have paperwork, so he can’t work.”
--El Hassan, 13, orange picker
--El Hassan, 13, orange picker
“I wish he can focus on following his dreams, but I need him to work. He is our only source of income."
--speaking about his son, Roukaya Ayoub, mother
--speaking about his son, Roukaya Ayoub, mother
A child harvests coffee beans in the department of El Paraiso, 120 km east of Tegucigalpa, Honduras, on December 20, 2010. Honduras, a country that hopes to become the the first coffee exporter in Central America, does not regulate child labor.
A Burmese girl carries cement on her head as she works at a construction site for a new hotel December 6, 2011 in NayPyiTaw, Burma. NayPyiTaw is the capitol city of Myanmar, formally in Yangon until the Burmese government created a new secluded capitol closed off from much of the world until recently.
An Indian migrant boy works in a sari factory in Katmandu, Nepal, on June 12, 2012
A boy cuts roses in a greenhouse in Cruz Blanca, San Juan Sacatepequez, 50 km (31 miles) from Guatemala City, on May 7, 2012. The cultivation and trade of roses is the highest economic activity in San Juan Sacatepequez.
Boys working at a shop selling coal take a break in Yangonk, Burma, on May 27, 2012.
A young miner holds on tight to a rope as he descends into a deep narrow hole in the ground in a field in Anzanakaro near the south-western Madagascan town of Ilakaka on September 14, 2008. Local miners in the region work deep narrow holes where they scrape gravel and sand in the search for sapphires and fortune. According to an official Madagascan study, of the 21,000 thousand children living in the region, 19,000 belong to working families.
An Indian child reacts to the camera as she collects recyclable spare parts at an automobile yard on the outskirts of Jammu, India, on December 10, 2011. India remains home to the greatest number of child laborers in the world despite efforts by successive governments to address the problem through compulsory education and anti-poverty programs.