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Child Labor and Education in Latin America
Data gathered by the International Labor Organization (ILO) in 2006 show that over 5.7 million children between five and fourteen years are economically active in Latin America and the Caribbean.
According to ILO Convention No. 182, the worst forms of child labor include: trafficking; forced and bonded labor; armed conflict; prostitution and pornography; and, illicit activities. Latin American and the Caribbean have the highest incidents of children engaged in trafficking, prostitution and pornography. The majority of children either work cultivating and/or harvesting such crops as sugar cane, coffee, banana, sisal, tobacco, oranges, and many other fruits and vegetables. Children can be found in the informal sector working in the street and in households. Most children performing household shores, mainly girls between 8 and 12 years old, are not paid for their service. Millions of girls work in their own homes so that their mothers can go to work. The income earned by the children is significant to the family unit. According to UNESCO, one in every three Latin Americans lives in extreme poverty. It can be argued that the low level of education in the region may be related to the prevalence of child labor. There is a great concern among child advocates surrounding the impact child labor has had on the low levels of educational attainment within the region. Even though improvements have been made that prioritize early childhood educational programs, these are mainly targeted at the middle-class urban areas. Overall repetition and dropout rates remain high. There are profound disparities in level of education depending on the child's economic conditions and origin. UNESCO estimated in 2002 that adult illiteracy reaches an average of approximately 10% of the regional population; however, rates of functional literacy are well below this figure. It is also known that there is a direct correlation between the value placed on educational persistence among children in a family unit and the educational levels achieved by their parents or primary caregivers (Catholic Agency for Overseas Development, January 1999 -as published in NACLA, New York). The roots of child labor are complex in nature; success is difficult at the individual child's level when social and economic conditions remains unchanged. Child and Adolescent Statutes
Winrock International in Latin America
Winrock has over 20 years of experience in Latin America addressing issues to reduce poverty and foster development. In Brazil, Winrock established the only field office in the region in 1996.
CIRCLE Project in Latin America
Innovative and holistic approaches from community-based organizations were used to address the prevention/reduction of child labor through education under the CIRCLE project. Winrock also documented Best Practices that have the potential to be replicated or scaled up by other practitioners in the field.
Winrock used its worldwide presence targeting those areas with the greatest prevalence of children who are both economically active and not attending school, working in spheres around three project bases in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. In Latin America, the CIRCLE Project funded organizations in the following countries:
CIRCLE Objectives
Special solicitation efforts were made in Latin America to target local groups and community networks involved in education projects that contribute directly to the following objectives outlined by the US Department of Labor:
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CIRCLE in Latin America