NO to child labour – YES to quality education! World Day Against Child Labour, 12 June 2015

Highlights

  1. United against child labour

    On the occasion of the World Day Against Child Labour 2015, Nobel Peace Prize laureate Kailash Satyarthi, the First Lady of Panama Ms. Lorena Castillo de Varela, the Secretary of Labour and Social Welfare of Mexico, Mr. Alfonso Navarrete Prida, the Executive Director of the Federation of Kenyan Employers, Ms. Jacqueline Mugo, and the General Secretary of the International Trade Union Confederation, Ms. Sharan Burrow, all came together with the ILO's Director General Guy Ryder to say "No to child labour - Yes to quality education!”

  2. How many tweets with hashtag #NOChildLabour have been sent on June 12?

    7,372 tweets. Thanks for sharing your activities and for making World Day Against Child Labour a great success! 

More than 168 million children are trapped in child labour. More than half of them, 85 million, are in hazardous work. This persistence of child labour is rooted in poverty and lack of decent work for adults, lack of social protection, and a failure to ensure that all children are attending school through to the legal minimum age for admission to employment.

The World Day Against Child Labour this year will focus particularly on the importance of quality education as a key step in tackling child labour. It is very timely to do so, as in 2015 the international community will be reviewing reasons for the failure to reach development targets on education and will be setting new goals and strategies. Read more...

On this year’s World Day Against Child Labour we call for:

  • free, compulsory and quality education for all children at least to the minimum age for admission to employment and action to reach those presently in child labour;
  • new efforts to ensure that national policies on child labour and education are consistent and effective;
  • policies that ensure access to quality education and investment in the teaching profession.

Get involved

  1. "Music against Child Labour" Initiative

    The “Music against Child Labour” Initiative links the ILO-IPEC with famous conductors, musicians, musicians’ organizations and music education bodies.

Get informed

  1. 2015 World Report on Child Labour

    World Report on Child Labour 2015

    The second volume of the ILO World Report on Child Labour series highlights the close linkages between child labour and good youth employment outcomes.

Child stories

  1. Out of child labour and into school: The story of Alimjan

    Alimjan’s mother did not see any harm in her son’s work, even though he was still a child. On the contrary, she believed that the sooner he learned how to earn money, the better. Read Alimjan's story.

  2. The way back to school: The story of Saddis Kumar

    Saddis Kumar's mother works in a tea plantation in Sri Lanka. His father is unable to work due to a health problem. Saddis was about to fall into child labour, but then the ILO intervened. Read his story.

Videos

Kailash Satyarthi calls on ILO constituents to help make child labour history Turkey: Taking child labour out of hazelnut harvesting
Fighting child labour - Thai rock stars explain why they're getting involved Out of work and into school - combating child labour through education