KABUL (ILO News) – A new report on bonded labour in Afghan brick kilns found more than half of the workers surveyed were children, with the majority of these workers under the age of 14.
The survey, “Buried in Bricks: Rapid Assessment of Bonded Labour in Afghan Brick Kilns”, aims to provide an accurate picture of bonded and child labour in brick kilns in two provinces of Afghanistan, Nangarhar and Kabul. The study was commissioned by the International Labour Organization (ILO) and conducted by Samuel Hall Consulting.
The survey found that 56 per cent of brick makers in the Afghan kilns are children under the age of 18 (58 per cent boys and 42 per cent girls), and 47 per cent are 14 or younger (33 per cent boys and 14 per cent girls). Most children began working between seven and eight years old, and by the age of nine almost 80 per cent of children are working. Only 15 per cent of the children attended school, the main reason for not doing so being the need to help their families. Consequently they do not acquire the skills necessary to break out of bonded labour, and, with the intergenerational transference of debt, children have no choice but to follow in the footsteps of their parents
Of the adult workers, 98% were men. Unlike the brick kiln industry in other countries, like Nepal and India, in Afghanistan the industry is male dominated and “the exclusion of women from the work force places a greater dependence on child labour”, the report says. Only young girls work alongside their brothers and fathers and as soon as they reach puberty they are kept in the home. This does not mean that their work ceases; it simply shifts to family work, which is unpaid and often undercounted in child labour statistics.
The brick kilns rely almost entirely on debt bondage and workers and their families are tied to a kiln by the need to pay off loans taken for basic necessities, medical expenses, weddings and funerals, rather than one-time expenses such as those related to entrepreneurship. The report finds that basic subsistence needs force families to take repeated loans, often paying for a winter’s food with a loan they must spend an entire season paying back. Of the families surveyed, 64 per cent had worked in the kilns for 11 years or more and 35 per cent for more than 20 years. Nearly all (98 per cent) households fell vulnerable to debt bondage while living in Pakistan as refugees or migrants.
Both adult and child labourers work more than 70 hours a week, in very poor conditions. Average daily wages are between 297 and 407 Afghanis (US$6.23-8.54) for an adult and 170-278 Afghanis (US$3.57-5.82) for a child.
Bonded labour arrangements keep wages low. However, the report says that given the current conditions in the brick industry, high levels of competition and the notoriously low profit margins, kiln owners cannot increase wages or improve conditions without effectively pricing themselves out of the market.
“While a worst form of child labour, we need to resist the temptation to immediately ban this form of child labour” said Hervé Berger, ILO Representative in Afghanistan. “Doing so would worsen the lives of those concerned and drive the practice underground. The issue of bonded and child labour is at its core an economic problem that requires economic solutions. We need to work together with the government to find holistic responses to these phenomena.”
The report also warns that the anticipated contraction in the Afghan construction sector, as donor spending is reduced, will force many brick kiln owners to shut down or reduce wages, making survival even harder for bonded labourers.
The report describes work in brick kilns as“ one of the most prevalent, yet least known, forms of hazardous labour in Afghanistan – for both children and adults – and one of the worst forms of labour for children in particular”.
The survey was carried out between August and October 2011. Information was gathered (through interviews and surveys) from around 2,000 people involved in the brick industry including adult and child workers, other household members, brick kiln owners, recruiters, community leaders and other stakeholders.
For more information please contact:
Mr Herve Berger
ILO Senior Coordinator for Afghanistan
Email
Tel.: +93 202 124 502
Mr Khair M. Niru
Deputy Minister of Labour a.i. for Afghanistan
Email
Print
Email