Sugar around the world →
Copyright © 2006 - 2009 Ethical Sugar
Site created with SPIP by
A. LE FLOCH
MANILA (AFP) - The United States is to donate 5.5 million dollars to fight child labour in the Philippines, the US embassy said Wednesday.
The funds are intended to "remove 18,000 children and prevent another 12,000 children from hazardous work in sugar cane plantations, child domestic work, commercial sexual exploitation, mining and quarrying, garbage scavenging, and pyrotechnics," the embassy said in a statement.
The aid package will also be targeted at the educational needs of children engaged in or at risk from the worst forms of child labour, the embassy added.
The funds will go to non-government organisations such as World Vision, the Christian Children's Fund and the Education Research and Development Assistance Foundation, which will implement the programme.
The National Statistics Office estimates that there are four million child labourers in the Philippines and that more than half are involved in abusive or dangerous work.
About 30 percent of the child labourers do not have any schooling, the office said.