A journey to child labour free in supply chains

Erna, 16 years old, has to wake up early morning at 5 am, preparing herself to go to work at a garment factory in Sukabumi, West Java. She always puts on some make-up to make her appearance older. Manipulating the age or borrowing another person’s diploma is not a secret for underage applicants who work in garment factories. They have to work to support their families although they have to face the harsh reality that as child labourers they do not have time to play, to go to school or to be a child.

Erna’s story was captured in a short video screened at the commemoration of the World Day Against Child Labour 2016 held at @America in Jakarta on 8 June. Under the theme “Tackling Child Labour in Supply Chains”, the commemoration was jointly conducted by the ILO and the United States Embassy in Jakarta.

Erna is one of the 168 million child labourers who involves and is part of the global and domestic supply chains. Supply chains are the sequence of activities/processes involved in the production and distribution of a product. With globalization, supply chains have become increasingly complex, involving workers, small producers, and enterprises around the world.

Francesco d’Ovidio, Country Director of the ILO in Indonesia, stated that in supply chains, child labour may be performed in small workshops or homes. As a result, this often goes undetected by firms at the top of the chain, making it difficult to identify and remedy.

“If we go to a garment or shoe or food factory, we might not find children working there. Yet we have to remember that although the last link of the supply chain might be child labour free, one has to trace back the previous links to ensure that violations are not hidden in the process,” he said during the discussion session.

As an Assessment and Remediation Manager of GAP in Indonesia, Toni Wahid, admitted that age manipulation was common in the garment sector. From thousands of job applicants, the company would find around 20 to 30 percent of them were under age children with fake identities. With only hundred thousands, a 15-year old child could obtain documents saying that she/he was over 18 years old.

“We have zero tolerance to child labour. We do a double verification and have set a strict criteria to verify documents in the application process to ensure that all of the 93 factories GAP operates across Sukabumi, Jakarta and Central Java do not employ children,” Toni stated.

In addition, multinational enterprises may be linked to it in international supply chains directly – through their own facilities, suppliers or subcontractors – or simply by having operations in areas where child labour is common. Therefore, Morgan C. Hall, Political Officer of the US Embassy for Indonesia, as one of the resource persons, supported the government of Indonesia to actively monitor the supply chains to tackle child labour in supply chains.

“The US government has closely collaborated with world leaders and relevant organizations to find solutions in tackling child labour issues. We closely work with the ILO, for example, to eliminate child labour worldwide, including in Indonesia.”

For a long term solution, Laurend Sinaga, Acting Director of Labour Norms, Women and Children of the Ministry of Manpower, hoped that more company social responsibility (CSR) programmes under private companies should focus on education. Through these educational programmes, children would have wider access to free education and they do not have to work.

“The government could not tackle child labour alone. To end child labour in supply chains we have to work together. It is truly everybody’s business,” he stated.

All supply chains, from agriculture to manufacturing, services to construction, run the risk that child labour may present. It is estimated that around 59 percent of child labour is in agriculture, followed by 32 percent in hospitality (including domestic work) and 7 percent in manufacturing industry.

More than 230 invitees attended the commemoration, including government officials, trade unions, employers’ organizations, international and national organizations, students and mass media. To mark the World Day, the representatives of the government, employer, worker, ILO and the US embassy cut the images of the child labourers from the three-dimension supply chains graphics.

“The cutting represents the symbolic commitments from the key labour actors of Indonesia, calling for united efforts to prevent children from becoming involved in hazardous work, especially in the supply chains,” explained Arum Ratnawati, the ILO’s Chief Technical Adviser on Child Labour.