Children’s or adolescents’ participation in work that does not affect their health and personal development or does not interfere with their schooling, is generally regarded as being something positive. This includes activitiesCollective term for actions that can be performed on sub-products in the supply chain, involving one or two members. such as helping their parents around the home, assisting in a family business or earning pocket money outside school hours and during school holidays. These kinds of activities contribute to children’s development and to the welfare of their families; they provide them with skills and experience and help to prepare them to be productive members of society during their adult life. This includes:
- Regular employment/work: From the age of 15 (in developing economies 14) children can start general employment or work not exceeding 48 hours per week. In countries where the minimum age is higher or the number of permitted hours of work is lower, the national set minimum age and maximum hours apply. Children’s work should be non-hazardous, but should be safe and age-appropriate and not interfere with compulsory education.
- Light work: Work that is not harmful to the health and development of a childAny human being below the age of 18 years. (UN CRC article 1). More, does not interfere with their schooling or training, is under the supervision of an adult, and does not exceed 14 hours a week. In line with ILO Convention 138, children aged 12-14 may perform light work in countries with developing economies. In countries where national law does not allow children to perform light work, the national minimum age for entry into employment applies.
- Family work: Farming activities performed by children on their small-scale family/household farms that consist of light, age-appropriate duties that give them an opportunity to develop skills, do not classify as child laborWork that deprives children of their childhood, their potential, and their dignity, and that is mentally, physically, socially, or morally dangerous and harmful to children. It includes work that interferes with their schooling by depriving them of the opportunity to attend school or obliging them to leave school prematurely; or requiring them to attempt to combine school attendance with excessively long and heavy work. This includes:
• The worst forms of child labor:[2] including all forms of slavery or practices similar to slavery, such as the sale and trafficking of children, debt bondage and serfdom, and forced or compulsory labor, including forced or compulsory recruitment of children for use in armed conflict; the use, procuring or offering of a child for prostitution, for the production of pornography or pornographic performances; the use, procuring or offering of a child for other illicit activities.
• Hazardous work: The worst forms of child labor also include hazardous work, which by its nature or the circumstances in which it is carried out, is likely to harm the health, safety, or morals of children. This includes but is not limited to carrying heavy loads, work in dangerous locations, in unhealthy situations, at night, or with hazardous substances or equipment, or work over long hours or at height. Countries which have signed the ILO Convention 182 are required to develop a national list of tasks that are considered hazardous for children. Where available, these national lists of hazardous tasks apply. In the absence of national lists of hazardous tasks, advice may be sought from competent national authorities such as Departments of Labor, Agriculture, Child Welfare etc) and/or the national ILO office.
• Underage child labor: Work that is conducted by children younger than 15 years of age for the farm, group, or group members, that interferes with their schooling, exceeds 14 hours a week, or is not considered “light work or family work”. In case national law has set the minimum work age at 14 years this age applies. In case national law has set the minimum work age at a higher age than 15, the national minimum age for entering employment applies.[3]
Please see below a diagram regarding age restrictions between child work and child labor. [Graph 1.1] Graph 1.1 illustrating the age differences in child work, child labor and the worse forms of child labor.[4] Please note, the numbers in brackets are the lower minimum ages allowed by ILO for member countries whose economy and educational facilities are insufficiently developed. (ILO Convention, Worst Forms of Child Labour Convention, 1999 (No. 182)) More provided that the activities are not harmful to their health and development, do not interfere with schooling, and are under the supervision of an adult.