The twin challenges of child labour and educational marginalisation in the South-East and East Asia region: An overview

In view of the measurement challenges, and in order to facilitate cross-country comparisons, the Report uses two methods to approximate child labour. It first presents child labour estimates based on the methodology employed by ILO in its global child labour estimates. Following this, it relies on the broader concept of employment as an approximation of child labour. Children in employment are those engaged in any economic activity for at least one hour during the reference period. It includes forms of work in both the formal and informal economy; inside and outside family settings; work for pay or profit (in cash or in kind, part-time or full-time), or as a domestic worker outside the child’s own household for an employer (with or without pay). It is worth repeating that these child labour approximations are not necessarily consistent with child labour as defined in legal terms in individual countries. The Report focuses mainly on children between 5 and 14 years of age; the analysis is extended to include 15-17 year olds when dealing with hazardous work.