FRIDAY, March 29, 2024
nationthailand

Bangkok seeks end to child labour by 2020

Bangkok seeks end to child labour by 2020

Govt yet to submit two reports to the US

 
AT LEAST 540 companies in 33 provinces have joined the Labour Ministry’s Department of Labour Protection and Welfare campaign against the use of child and forced labour. 
They erected signs saying “All Together Against Child Labour and Forced Labour” to express solidarity in a stance against such abuses from June 6 to July 13, Department of Labour Protection and Welfare Director-General Pannee Sriyudhsak said recently.
Despite Thailand’s recent upgrade from Tier 3 to Tier 2 watchlist in the US State Department’s 2016 report on the fight against human trafficking the country had more to do. 
Pannee said Thailand had yet to submit two other reports to the US Ministry of Labour: One on the worst forms of child labour, and a second on lists of goods produced by child or forced labour (also known as the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorisation Act List and the List of Products Produced by Forced or Indentured Child Labour). 
There were five Thai products on the lists, she said – textiles, shrimp, fish, sugarcane and pornography.
The country must formulate and implement an action plan to eliminate the worst forms of child labour as a priority mission, she said, as this was required under Article 182 of the International Labour Organisation Convention on the Worst Forms of Child Labour, which Thailand ratified in February 2001. 
Following the formulation of a master plan for the fiscal years from 2009 to 2014, agencies are now working on a second national plan for the fiscal years 2015 to 2020. This national policy and plan has five crucial strategies to carry out to eradicate the worst forms of child labour by 2020, she said. 
To achieve that goal, all related agencies must work together for concrete results, she said, adding that they had to implement projects by integrating work towards the same goal, while considering each strategy’s objectives and aiming for outcomes to link with indicators for follow-up evaluation. 
They also had to learn about problems to find solutions and points on how to improve the national plan, Pannee said. Participation by businesses was crucial, she added. 
She said she hoped that Thailand would be upgraded to a higher ranking in the Trafficking In Persons Report and would be able to maintain its current ranking on the Child Labour Situation Report, and that four Thai products – shrimp, fish, clothing and sugarcane – would be withdrawn from the List of Goods Produced by Child Labour and Forced Labour.
 
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