One Million Children In Thailand Are Suffering From Labour Abuse

[Jai Dee]

ILO reports that about one million children in Thailand are suffering from labour abuse

The International Labour Organization (ILO) finds about one million children in Thailand are suffering from labour abuse.

ILO coordinator Thaneeya Runcharoen (ธนียา รุญเจริญ) said these children have been beggars, made to do house work and forced to work in the fisheries, agriculture and service sectors.

Many have been used to smuggle in drugs and contraband or have had to work in sweat shops and sex industry, Ms. Thaneeya said. Most have to work more than eight hours a day but are paid below the daily minimum wage or nothing at all, she said.

Ms. Thaneeya said Thailand could solve child labour problems to a certain level during the past 20 years as the number of child workers had reduced from four to one million.

She said labour officials should ensure that children are not forced to work long hours, are paid fair wages and are not abused both physically and mentally by their employers.

Source: Thai National News Bureau Public Relations Department - 23 August 2006

[taxexile]

She said labour officials should ensure that children are not forced to work long hours, are paid fair wages and are not abused both physically and mentally by their employers.

.......... she also said that officials should also ensure that the new airport opened on schedule , the police act in the best interest of the public , terrorists are prevented from entering thailand , a cure for cancer is found quickly and everyones sore throats are cleared up , before robustly singing the third verse of lonnie donegans hit song "does your chewing gum lose its flavour on the bedpost overnight"

[Scott]

While checking a few other threads, I noticed that these children should all be in school with the wonderful and well-qualified and trained English teachers drifting around Thailand!

[fruittbatt]

to make sense of where the problem really lies, it would have been helpful if the ILO coordinator had provided a breakdown of the industries where children are employed. I suspect the rural/agricultural sector would be the largest "employer" of children, since many from rural poor families have little option but to leave school once they have completed primary education and help out their families.

[astral]

I find the figures hard to believe.

That is 1/60th of the total population of Thailand and represents one child in every 15 working......

Not possible.

Based on the figures at this site with 25% of the population under 15.

[atlastaname]

Can't see what the big deal is here.

So they are paying them below the adult wage ...so? When i was young (in the UK) children frequently worked after/before school as paperboys etc , or stacking shelves on a saturday and we were paid a pittance , well below adult wages. The purpose is to give children an idea of what work entails and teaches them financial discipline for when they are older. So whats wrong with Thai children, who are most likely more in need of cash then the spoilt westerners, doing some work ?

Far better i would suggest then the UK system , where the overweight spoilt children spend their time spending their parents money on computer games to watch in their luxury high tech bedrooms or slumped in front of their plasma screens , whilst they wait to become 18 when they can have an even bigger scive at the taxpayers expense going to university to study something they will never need or use.

Better tha getting off their fat <deleted> and working tho !!

[seri thai]

FOURTH YORKSHIREMAN:

Right. I had to get up in the morning at ten o'clock at night half an hour before I went to bed, drink a cup of sulphuric acid, work twenty-nine hours a day down mill, and pay mill owner for permission to come to work, and when we got home, our Dad and our mother would kill us and dance about on our graves singing Hallelujah.

FIRST YORKSHIREMAN:

And you try and tell the young people of today that ..... they won't believe you.

[WISteve]

I live in a rural area of the US where family farms are quickly becoming a thing of the past. Large families were economicly vital to keep the farm going, and I'm sure it's even more so in Thailand with far less mechanization. Some of the best and hardest working people I know grew-up on a farm where a work ethic is instilled pretty early in life. Every year more and more of my farm clients are selling out because even with the kids helping daily, it's tough to generate a comfortable living in agriculture. It's only the largest and most efficient that survive anymore.

With nearly 50% of the labor force in Thailand still working in agriculture (compared to 1% here in the US) I'm surprised their numbers of "laboring children" isn't far higher actually. Because I'm sure it's a matter of economic survival for many families.

I don't think the city slickers have a clue sometimes......

~WISteve

[seri thai]

moved to correct thread!

Edited August 23, 2006 by seri thai

[Scott]

I don't know how the ILO is getting their figures, but generally children helping their parents, such as on the family farm are not considered as laborers. One reason is that they usually are not get a wage for the work.

As for many westerners who worked as a child (I did), we were usually doing so to earn extra money--not as a necessity for the support of the family. I always had a part time job, but don't ever remember turning over the money to my parents or being forced to buy groceries. Child laborers aren't exactly in the same class as the PM daughter when she was working at McDonald's.

[leisurely]

All that about agricultural labourers is true. But, what about those pathetic flower garland sellers, the newspaper and lottery result vendors? Only recently it was reported that a child had been knocked over and killed while selling. I think it is dreadfully sad, a childhood should be a childhood which includes schooling not working. Very glad we are not in that situation.

[meemiathai]

My wife had to work to help the family when she was a child.......

[sunreader]

Can't see what the big deal is here.

So they are paying them below the adult wage ...so? When i was young (in the UK) children frequently worked after/before school as paperboys etc , or stacking shelves on a saturday and we were paid a pittance , well below adult wages. The purpose is to give children an idea of what work entails and teaches them financial discipline for when they are older. So whats wrong with Thai children, who are most likely more in need of cash then the spoilt westerners, doing some work ?

Far better i would suggest then the UK system , where the overweight spoilt children spend their time spending their parents money on computer games to watch in their luxury high tech bedrooms or slumped in front of their plasma screens , whilst they wait to become 18 when they can have an even bigger scive at the taxpayers expense going to university to study something they will never need or use.

Better tha getting off their fat <deleted> and working tho !!

"Many have been used to smuggle in drugs and contraband or have had to work in sweat shops and sex industry, Ms. Thaneeya said"

Thats what the big deal is about. Did you have to sell your ass when you were 10? or cross borders with heroin?

[atlastaname]

Usual media blowup. They probably found one or two who had been "abused" amoung the tens of thousands and then made an article exaggerating wildly. Happens all the time , because it sells newspapers.

Fact is , the world is obsessed with child protection issues (or rather the usa and the UK are and are trying to impose it all around the world....unsuccessfully). There is nothing wrong with children working and i'm sure they and their families would rather they worked and brought some money in than be unemployed in countries where there is no unemployment benefit. Better to work than starve is it not ??

Going to school is fine but it doesn't pay the bills does it

[fruittbatt]

Usual media blowup. They probably found one or two who had been "abused" amoung the tens of thousands and then made an article exaggerating wildly. Happens all the time , because it sells newspapers.

Fact is , the world is obsessed with child protection issues (or rather the usa and the UK are and are trying to impose it all around the world....unsuccessfully). There is nothing wrong with children working and i'm sure they and their families would rather they worked and brought some money in than be unemployed in countries where there is no unemployment benefit. Better to work than starve is it not ??

Going to school is fine but it doesn't pay the bills does it

I am imagining that your post is a sick attempt at satire, as I cannot believe that you have lived/been in Thailand and never seen the abuse of children on the street. I am not talking about kids who help in the family business after school, but kids forced to beg by drunk fathers or mothers without jobs, who physically abuse them when they don't make enough baht. If you are observant you may also notice how other kids on the street (often boys under 12) are occasionally approached by farang or Thai men, and disappear with them. These are common sights in touristed areas of Chiang Mai. I have also seen foreign paedophiles with very young boys in Hua Hin and Bangkok, and many child beggars in the Patumwan area of Bangkok.

[atlastaname]

No it was a serious post.

I don't disagree with anything you have said , all the examples you have given i can quite imagine are true.

However, its a fact of life . It happens. What is your magic solution i would love to know .....

My post was saying that there is nothing wrong with children working , like in the factories , or on the land , and earning something , anything . Better than sitting at home and starving isn't it? Other countries don't have the restrictive laws regarding child labour that we do in the UK , in the Far East the issue of children working is viewed very differently. I believe that they should be allowed to run their country according to their customs not have some religeous nuts or do-gooders with too much time on their hands telling them how they should run it .

As an example , when i was first in Thailand in the early 1990's it was a common sight to see children standing at a cigarette stall on the street selling cigarettes. Now i don't smoke but i can't see anything wrong with that at all. They seemed happy and were presumably getting some experience and earning a little at the same time . Around the time Taksin got in for the first time it all changed and children virtually vanished off the streets , especially after 10pm. So now they are presumably stuck at home of an evening earning nothing . So what good has this restrictive action done .? Just cut their income , however small that may have been.

All this talk about "they should be in school etc etc...." , a huge number have no interest in school and /or are just not bright enough to learn . They can't all be brain surgeons you know . The fact is money makes the world go around . It does ...period. So the sooner they are out earning it the sooner they just might save some (a small percentage i admit) or at the very least can help their families who need it .

Friutbatts reply seems obsessed with the issue of sex, but the OP talked also about them being abused by working in industry and on the land . How is that abuse ?? Its called getting out to work and earning your keep. Shame the spolit brats in England don't get the same treatment. Instead they are encouaged to stay on as long as they possibly can at school /uni (at my expense) , rather than contributing to the country.

I know i'm saying the unsayable , very politically incorrect and all that , but that is life in some countries. If they want to work ....let them . If they don't .. thats different. There should be no force of course.

[fruittbatt]

No it was a serious post.

I don't disagree with anything you have said , all the examples you have given i can quite imagine are true.

However, its a fact of life . It happens. What is your magic solution i would love to know .....

My post was saying that there is nothing wrong with children working , like in the factories , or on the land , and earning something , anything . Better than sitting at home and starving isn't it? Other countries don't have the restrictive laws regarding child labour that we do in the UK , in the Far East the issue of children working is viewed very differently. I believe that they should be allowed to run their country according to their customs not have some religeous nuts or do-gooders with too much time on their hands telling them how they should run it .

As an example , when i was first in Thailand in the early 1990's it was a common sight to see children standing at a cigarette stall on the street selling cigarettes. Now i don't smoke but i can't see anything wrong with that at all. They seemed happy and were presumably getting some experience and earning a little at the same time . Around the time Taksin got in for the first time it all changed and children virtually vanished off the streets , especially after 10pm. So now they are presumably stuck at home of an evening earning nothing . So what good has this restrictive action done .? Just cut their income , however small that may have been.

All this talk about "they should be in school etc etc...." , a huge number have no interest in school and /or are just not bright enough to learn . They can't all be brain surgeons you know . The fact is money makes the world go around . It does ...period. So the sooner they are out earning it the sooner they just might save some (a small percentage i admit) or at the very least can help their families who need it .

Friutbatts reply seems obsessed with the issue of sex, but the OP talked also about them being abused by working in industry and on the land . How is that abuse ?? Its called getting out to work and earning your keep. Shame the spolit brats in England don't get the same treatment. Instead they are encouaged to stay on as long as they possibly can at school /uni (at my expense) , rather than contributing to the country.

I know i'm saying the unsayable , very politically incorrect and all that , but that is life in some countries. If they want to work ....let them . If they don't .. thats different. There should be no force of course.

First, I appreciate your implied suggestion that many g_od-botherers and some other western forms of interference and imposition of values are latter-day versions of colonialism, and as such an unwelcome insult to an Asian or African host country. However, the issue of child-labour is not merely a case of the West trying to impose its values or human rights concerns re child protection onto an unwilling nation which thinks differently about the matter.

Not all Thais are so poor that they rely on their children's labour to make ends meet. Far from it. I suggest that one reason you see fewer children selling on the street has to do with the increased prosperity of many urban Thai families. In parts of Vietnam and Cambodia, India, and even Sri Lanka it is still common to see children selling cigarettes or chewing gum or whatever on the street in order to be able to help their families and attend school.

Thais would be the first to assert their children's right to a childhood. To Thai families children are a great gift. Young children are pampered and indulged and loved to pieces by their extended families and friends. When children grow up they are expected to care for their parents in their old age. This means they must have a good job, based on an education. The enthusiasm of Thai families for educating their children is then a sort of insurance as well as being based on a sincere wish to give their kids the best they possibly can.

The problem is that Thailand, like the rest of the world is not a level playing field in economic terms. Rich kids living in Bangkok or Chiang Mai can enjoy motorbikes, mobile phones, computers, clothes, private education, and plenty of leisure-time for further consumption, sport, creative pursuits etc. To a kid from Isaan. Klong Toey, or any poor family, such a life is the stuff of impossible dreams. This child probably will have to help out in the family business, or sell garlands, flowers or yaa baa on the street, or leave school early to work and help the family.

The issue of child labour is not just about "child-protection": it is also about the vexed problem of trying to create equal opportunity in an unequal world. I think you hit on a very valid point in saying "not everyone can be a brain surgeon". Why? Because not everyone has the same educational and financial opportunities which would enable them to become a well-paid respected professional in a chosen field if that is what they want to do.

What is my solution? create more opportunities for a greater number of children: by giving them an education which will help to equip them to deal with the complexities of the world and provide formal and social skills to help them to earn a decent living in a dynamic local and global economic environment. For some, that will mean they do get to be brain surgeons; for others it will mean that they can read labels which may save lives, prepare a budget which might save their family from a debt cycle, or read a maintenance manual for a piece of farm equipment and learn how weld.

If a child can also earn pocket money, & learn responsibility and social skills through participating in family business voluntarily in their leisure time, fantastic. If a child hates school and just wants to work on the farm or in the business, then once they have completed compulsory education, they can usually choose to work. If their labor is conscripted, involuntary, and exploitative (eg child soldiers, child prostitutes, child beggars etc), that surely does require intervention by appropriate local authorities.

Edited August 27, 2006 by fruittbatt

[atlastaname]

Got to agree with FRUITBATT this time around

[footfall]

Related article :

Sex-slave trafficking campaigner speaks in Chiang Mai

Elle Faraday

Sometimes in life, you meet someone who makes everything you’ve done in your life seem insignificant compared to what they’ve achieved. Norma Hotaling is one of these people. Norma is the founder and director of SAGE, an organisation dedicated to helping those living on the streets and involved in prostitution. Her story is an incredibly powerful one.

Norma Hotaling

Norma spent 20 years on the streets of San Francisco as a heroin addict and prostitute. In 1989, she was released from prison and vowed to turn her life around. She enrolled on a detox and support programme and moved into a ‘sober living’ programme.

In 1990, Norma began seeing a counsellor who helped her to see that she wasn’t a bad person, just a tragic victim of circumstance. She had been abused as a child and her subsequent life spent on the streets was linked to this early experience. Her drug and alcohol addiction was merely a way to numb the pain she felt rather than dealing with it.

Just over two years after leaving prison, Norma earned herself a degree in Health Education and shortly after that, in 1995, she founded SAGE (Standing Against Global Exploitation) which was set up to “provide services locally and to advocate for an end to trafficking people for sex both nationally and internationally.”

Norma is “committed to the creation of alternatives to homelessness and the incarceration of women, girls, men and boys.” She wants to help ease as many people’s suffering as she can and use her experience to show others that there is a way out.

With the support and organisation of the United States Embassy, Norma has just finished a five day tour of the country where she was sharing her story and offering help and support to those who need it. She has been to Thailand four times before and each time learns a little bit more about what she described as a “wonderful country”. During her present trip, she has visited the many support groups in Thailand that are committed to helping the country’s many prostitutes. I was lucky enough to be present at a press conference that Norma gave in Chiang Mai last week.

She has specifically asked for her story not to be sensationalised so I hope I can document the facts accurately and paint an honest picture of a subject which is highly controversial as well as being incredibly shocking.

After explaining what SAGE is and what it hopes to achieve, Norma began by explaining that “Trafficking at its core is a supply and demand issue. The girls that are now being recruited and drugged and trafficked into Thailand are feeding a 30 million dollar trans-national organised crime ring.” This was a bold statement to make but was not made without its research. She went on to say, “It is so important to remember that the 30 million dollars is paid for one dollar at a time by men who have decided to buy a human being. They are the demand … We are taught to keep silent and protect the demand side of trafficking … How is this right? These men are feeding organised crime.”

Norma went on to explain that during her visits to the numerous support centres around Thailand, she found out that they are seeing more and more young boys who are being trafficked into the sex slave industry. She wants to see the authorities “really focus on the men who are buying children, both girls and boys.” She believes that in order to be effective, “It’s really important to look at the issue as a whole – then we start to see the oppression that exists.”She understands that to get people to listen takes time. She has been writing about the plight of trafficked girls in the US since 1992 and only now are people sitting up and listening. “It comes down to the same point as I was making at the beginning; take away the demand and you are left with nothing.” She has been working with the authorities in San Francisco and they are now arresting the men who are picking up the girls as well as the girls themselves. Men have to pay a stiff fine if they are caught with a prostitute. This fine goes towards one of the programmes which Norma has developed to help completely rehabilitate the girls and boys on the streets.

Norma gave a moving account of her own life story - hiding nothing, simply telling the facts. She has moved forward and wants to help as many young people as she can move forward with her. “It’s a horrible, horrible legacy for our children and its time for all of us around the world to join together and say we are going to stop this. Sex with children, taking advantage of their vulnerability and abusing power is wrong.” She wants people to judge these men very critically and not hide behind the fact that it is a taboo subject. She asked for Thailand to be the leader, “To step forward and protect its girls and boys who are being used to serve the huge sex industry here. If Thailand leads the way, many other countries will follow.”

I found her talk fascinating as did everyone else present. She was asked many questions, mainly on how to handle the vast number of tourists travelling to Bangkok on holiday and who do not see anything wrong with what they’re doing. Norma responded by saying, “It’s important for the people of Thailand to decide for themselves on what to say about that and what they think about it. I know what I think about it – it’s a racialised sexism because how these men justify it is by saying ‘Thai women like it…’ The men that do this look at women and children in very narrow ways. They take advantage of Thai people’s polite and kind nature. It’s up to Thailand to turn around and stop it.”

One of the last and possibly most powerful questions asked was how old are these children that are being sold into prostitution. She simply said, “5 or 6 years old.” We were all shocked into silence and the reality of this problem really sank in.Norma was leaving Chiang Mai to continue her excellent work in the US where she sees over 300 people a week walk through her doors. She is an inspiration to thousands and hopefully some of the girls she encounters will look to Norma and turn their lives around just as she has done.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

http://www.chiangmai-mail.com/current/news.shtml#hd8

[fruittbatt]

It is good that there are local organisations involved as well as foreign "experts" on human trafficking (which is a hugely controversial area of debate beyond the scope of this topic). I have reported blatant examples of paedophilia to the police in Chiang Mai and Hua Hin...even going to the length of photographing a skinny, weak, scab-covered Danish man with his arm around a boy of about 7 yrs (no- NOT his son) and taking the photo to the police station.

I have also reported the problems of paedophilia and abuse of child-beggars by their parents and minders to the so-called farang police aides in Chiang Mai. They had no idea what to do except to take the problem to the police...which I had already done, using halting Thai language skills & making sure they understood what I was talking about and where the activity was occurring.

The problem in Chiang Mai continues. Every time I go to that city I see the same thing & feel the same anger and frustration at being unable to address this exploitation of the most vulnerable members of Thai society : the street children. If anyone can provide contact details for local organisations which can address this issue directly, I would be grateful. I will also contact the Chiang Mai mail and thanks to you, Footfall, for this article.