HRW : Child Labor Exploited on US Farms

[Politics.be]

Children Work Long Hours for Little Pay in Dangerous Conditions “[When I was 12] they gave me my first knife,” said a 17-year-old who had started working on a farm in Michigan when he was 11. “Week after week I was cutting myself. Every week I had a new scar. My hands have a lot of stories.”


Hundreds of thousands of children work in agriculture in the United States. Under US law, children can toil in the fields at far younger ages, for far longer hours, and under far more hazardous conditions than other working youth.

Children as young as 11 or 12, and sometimes younger, work for 10 or more hours a day, five to seven days a week. They typically earn less than minimum wage. They work with heavy machinery, sharp tools, and dangerous chemicals and are four-times more likely to die than children working in other jobs.

Due to the long hours and demands of farmwork, it’s not surprising that one-third of child farmworkers drop out of school. This leaves them with few options other than a lifetime of farmwork and the poverty that accompanies it.

Help end hazardous child labor in America’s fields. Join Human Rights Watch in calling on the US Congress to amend the law to apply the same protections for children working in agriculture that already apply to all other working children.





Bron: politics.be

[Scherven A. Mok]

Zeer triest. En onze politici en kiesvee willen ook die weg naar rechts op.

[roger verhiest]

Dat verklaart misschien gedeeltelijk het feit dat er aan arbeidsongevallen jaarlijks meer sterven dan in gevoerde oorlogen.