The+People´s+Republic+of+China´s+Position+Paper

By Leyre Poza

Committe: International Labour Organization Topic: Child Labour Country: The People´s Republic of China

Child Labour is refered to the explotation of small children working in any system of economic production of a country, a region and the financial support of a family. This occurs in all the world but is more common to occur in undeveloped countries or developed countries. There are more differents forms of child labour; such as slavery, pornography, prostitution, human trafficking, forced or unpaid jobs. China has Child Labour because of three main different causes; the combination of poverty, failures in the national education system and a flexible legislation that doesn´t protect and promote the rights of children.

As I said before, this is common in undeveloped or poor countries such as China. China is a difficult country to talk about; China is very developed in new invections and things like that, but later most of the people there is poor so I think that is a developing country. China is a developing country where the explotation of children is very common and natural. This is due to a lot of different causes. China is a developing country where child labour is forbbiden but because the combination of poverty, failures in the national educational system and bad laws that make possible the abuses, it´s very common. The big culprit is the Chinese educational system. The country gives to education only 2.7% of GDP (gross domestic product), less than half of that recommended by the UN. The Primary and Secundary schools of small villages receive minimal or zero support, so the parents remain the main funders. So, it forces parents to make a cost/benefit ratio between the cost of educating their children, the potential profits or further study and the immediate beneficts of leaving the books and find a job early. It is also very difficult to allow this situation, because there are a lot of corruption between the members of the Government. The justifications that China says is that is a way to improve the economical situation of all those poor children or with few resources, but in many cases the Govern denies the explotation. There is a new factor, the economical globalization that is helping to increase child labour due to the competition in the global market, which makes everyone look down production costs. Multinantionals are the highest explotative of children. Most of the products of important shops of the world: Pestcides ( Baygon), cosmetics (Christian Dior), clothing, shoes (Nike, Reebok) or toys ( Chicco, Lego, Mattel),the 80% of this toys come from China, Thailand and Indonesia.

An important report released today by the ILO (Internacional Labour Organizaton), where it said that 246 million children between 5 and 17 years work, mostly in hazardous conditions. It was organized by the ILO to get attention aout this problem and try to solve it. 73% of these young people, about 180 million, play the worst forms of child labour; including the prostitution and hazardous work. Moreover, the figures also show that slavery has not dissapeared, as about 5.7 million of children are on a forced work. Although child labour remains a problem all over the world, 61% of the explotation is really common in Asia, most of whom are concentrated in China.

``Is unacceptable that there are so many children who are forced to work and support the suffering and abuses that often occur in this situation. It is intolerable. These children need to leran and develop, not just work to survive, ´´ said Carol Bellamy, Excutive Director of UNICEF. ``Boys and girls as young as five are forced to spend long hours doing backbreacking work, often in harsh weather and without access to health care.´´ said Ann M. Friday Veneman to celebrate the Sunday of the World Day Against Child Labour.

It is assumed that the government must take some actions about this issue, but the Chinese government in stead of stop it, is trying to clean the image of the precarious situation that the childen of the country are passing, the international complaints should exert the necessary pressure for it. Some ONGS in China say that instead of reducing child labour is increasing significantly. In China children under 16 have totally forbbiden work, but this is not fulfilled because is more significant the financial interest than the educational one. China is progressing in fits and starts and there is no cure for their children. 34% of Chinese children have a blood lead level too high, it is a clear example of the passivity of the government, we could mention many other examples that show that children in China are not treated properly at all levels.

The UN launched a project combined with the Chinese government that had the aim to fight malnutrition and improve food security among most vulnerable groups in the country. The iniciative, will expect to benefict 1.8 million people in the next three years. The program was designed to address food shortages specific in the poorest regions of China, taking into account the nutritional disparities between children living in urban and rural areas. Focusing on the proper feeding of children, the plan includes women, since breast-feeding has become shorter and low due to poor nutrition of mothers. Moreover, malnutrition is an inadequate intake of iodine, folic acid and vitamin A, among other elements required for good health and development of children. The agencies involved in the proyect trust on the good results will lead to the government to implement national policies similar iniciatives and ensure good nutrition for all the population.

I think that my country doesn´t know how to control this issue, because it is late. The Chinese government suggests the rest of the world that in China is not any kind of explotation, but we all know that this is not true, that the facts exist and this issue is spreading very quickly. What the government should do to solve this big problem is to put more strict and hard rules and the people who don´t respect the rules be punish with some type of fine, a cheaper educational system so all the children could have access to a quality training and the last thing that I think the government should do is to control the births.

China would like to accomplish in the comitte resolution is try to stop the explotation of child, but this is so difficult because some members of the government are involved in this type of abuses. I believe that is not how the position of other countries affect my country, is how other countries could help my country. Maybe countries with a good economy, such as USA or countries in Europe, could help undeveloped or developing countries with money, sending adults from their countries without work to go here and have a job or sending food, books and clothes for the poorest people.

I am going to finish my project writting down a chinese proverb that I have found about the child labour that say:`` The life of a child is like a piece of paper on which everyone who passes leave a signal. On the bodies of working children don´t leave messages of love, only deep injuries that maim them for the rest of their lives.´´

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