I Coast addresses child labour

2002-06-12 12:51

Abidjan - Fingered by the international community over child labour and slavery, especially in plantations, Ivory Coast defends itself by blaming immigrants, an economic conspiracy and underdevelopment.

"The fight against child trafficking is fundamentally the fight against poverty," Ivorian President Laurent Gbagbo said in January while launching a regional summit aimed at fighting the phenomenon.

"In places where the people are less well-to-do, they leave for other areas where they hope to find better living conditions," he said.

Western and central Africa house some of the world's poorest countries. Child labour and trafficking is a major problem in the region with some 200 000 children falling victim to the trade every year, according to Unicef.

Some poor families sell their offspring for as little as five euros.

Child labour is alleged to be flourishing in cocoa, coffee and cotton plantations. Since Ivory Coast is the world's largest cocoa producer, this charge is a major irritant for the government.

Children 'help out in the fields'

Ivorian authorities initially started out by denying this and blaming the foreign plantation owners, mainly Burkinabes and Malians, for employing children.

About 10% of the plantation owners are non-Ivorian.

"One must not exaggerate. It's true that the child trafficking networks are often ethnic. But it is also true that in these regions ethnicity spills over frontiers and the Ivorian planters take advantage of that as well," a community leader from a neighbouring country said on condition of anonymity.

He added: "In our part of the world, it is normal for children to help out in the fields."

The Ivorian reaction also has to do with the fact that the allegations have an economic impact.

In July 2001, the US house of representatives adopted a law calling for the creation of a label "chocolate made without the use of child labour".

Two months later, the US chocolate industry, which has vast interests in Ivory Coast, signed a pact designed at auto-regulation to prevent child slavery in the industry.

889 children freed in 2001

A vast study is currently under way in Cameroon, Ghana, Guinea, Ivory Coast and Nigeria to identify the current state of affairs and study ways of stopping child labour and slavery.

"While the countries of south-east Asia are becoming rich by developing their cocoa industry, one is portraying Ivory Coast as a country where slavery exists," an Ivorian official said on condition of anonymity.

The January regional meeting, held in Ivory Coast's political capital Yamoussoukro, agreed on a series of measures to fight child trafficking.

According to Interpol, 99 people were arrested in western Africa in 2001, against a paltry five a year earlier. In terms of interceptions, the number of children freed grew from 224 in 2000 to 889 last year.

But the vast majority of experts say the figures are merely the tip of the iceberg. - Sapa-AFP

- SAPA