WASHINGTON (OSV News): As the International Labour Organisation [ILO] of the United Nations took aim at child labour and the exploitation of children June 12, Pope Francis lent his support with a tweet.
“Many children, instead of receiving a good education, are exploited, subjected to slave labour,” Pope Francis wrote. “No effort should be spared to end the scourge of child labour! Children are our hope. Let us not allow that hope to be stifled!”
The ILO’s World Day Against Child Labour conference in Geneva focused on the worldwide scourge—an estimated 160 million children worldwide are used as labourers—with the ambitious goal of ending child labour completely by 2025.
The theme of the day was “social justice for all” as the way to end child labour, by helping governments to create and sustain jobs that pay well enough to lift families out of poverty, and to assist with child care to permit mothers to work outside the home.
The ILO is a UN agency that sets international labour standards.
Manuela Tomei, assistant director-general for the ILO’s governance, rights and dialogue group, observed that the current total of 160 million child workers has increased by more than eight million since 2016—the first increase in decades and the result of wars, civil unrest and poverty.
She called that “the very opposite of social justice,” adding, “The importance of universal social protections cannot be underestimated.”
Jérôme Bellion-Jourdan, deputy secretary-general of the International Organisation of Employers, quoted the ILO’s director-general, Gilbert Huongbo: “Child labour rarely happens because parents are bad, or do not care. Rather, it springs from a lack of social justice.”
Huongbo, a former prime minister of Togo, said in a recorded statement: “The antidote to poverty-driven child labour is decent work for adults. Decent work means ending forced labour.”
Giorgio Boccardo, the Chilean undersecretary of labour, said child labour “stops the development of children” and “generates poverty and inequality” among the most vulnerable.
