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Conclusions from the Conference on Child Labour Prevention and Elimination
Tirana, October 2004

Having discussed the issue of Child Labour in Albania we, participants of the ICFTU/FGTB/LO-Norway Conference “Trade Unions against Child Labour in Albania” that took place 11-12th of October 2004, Tirana, conclude that exploiting of child labour constitutes one of the major challenges for the country and workers of Albania. During the conference we had opportunity to discuss in depth the magnitude, origins, causes and forms of child labour that existed in Albania and also possible actions that trade unions had to undertake, in coalition with social partners and friendly groups, to efficiently eliminate Child Labour in Albania.

We highly appreciate the research conducted by the ICFTU prior to the conference. The research shows that child labour remains an important issue in Albania. The main areas where child labour is found in Albania are agriculture, garment and shoes industries, car washing, selling of different things on streets or markets (cigarettes, chewing gum; fruits, etc.), garbage sorting, begging, etc. Poverty brought to the country by unconsequtive policies of governments, in great extent influenced by IFIs, corruption and weak rule of law are the main but not the only reasons of child labour.

Internal migrations are disrupting the school system, awareness on the importance of education has declined amongst some sections of the population, whilst dysfunctional families, high rate of single parented children and orphans and the vendettas are other important factors leading to children dropping out of school and starting to work very young. Several thousand children drop out from the schools every year due to economic or social reasons.

Trade unions recognize the enormity of the problem that endangers future of the nation.  We reject arguments that child labour is inevitable, economically beneficial, socially acceptable or to the advantage of the children concerned and their families. In reality, child labour is a major problem to economic development, with enormous social and economic costs. Only when children are out of work and into school sustainable and equitable economy and society can be built.

Child Labour undermines the power of trade unions. Unscrupulous employers obsessed by profit would employ a child rather than an adult, which contributes to growth of unemployment. Secondly, child labour reinforces unorganized sector. Many children are working informally, together with their parents as sub-contractors or autonomously. Workers of the informal sector do not have protection and are extremely difficult to organise. They can not bargain for increase of their wages and are often exploited like slaves. Thirdly, child labour leads to growing poverty. Working children can not get proper education and have to work as unskilled workers, their health is undermined by devastating work conditions that limit their employment opportunities. Condemned to poverty they, in their turn, will not be able to ensure proper education for their children. It is a vicious circle. It is our common duty to break this circle.

We conclude that

  1. ILO Convention 138 and 182 have to be fully implemented at the national level, not only in law, but in practice;

 

  1. Effective poverty reduction and sustainable development is possible to be achieved only through broad dialog between Albanian social partners and involvement of the civil society; pressure on government and its institutions to ensure that social justice is the priority for country’s development and particularly realisation of children’s right has to be organised by unions;
  1. pressure on international institutions responsible for finance, trade, investment and other economic issues to adopt and implement policies which support universal access to education, investment in the future of the world’s children and ending child labour is necessary;

 

  1. organising and unionisation of the workforce is the best instrument to make child labour impossible; it particularly refers to the need to intensify trade union organising programs in private sector and informal economy;
  1. work to increase awareness of and commitment to the campaign to eliminate child labour, within Albanian trade union movement and in the wider public arena, including through trade union education and information activities, is necessary;

 

  1. constant monitoring of the situation of child labour should be done by Albanian unions together with state authorities, labour inspection and the civil society together with parents as multi-disciplinary teams;
  1. joint activities on supporting the right of all the children to free, basic education of good quality, and on confronting the exploitation of child labour by employers, both in export production and in domestic production and services, should be undertaken;

 

  1. pressure on European and International employers to ensure respect of fundamental workers rights by their members in Albania has to be done, among other through cooperation with unions of the respective countries;
  1. action to tackle the worst forms of child labour, and target the specific forms of exploitation that affect girls and boys respectively has to be prioritised;  close linkage between action against child labour and actions for respect for the other core labour standards in Albania must to be promoted;

 

  1. cooperation and dialogue with other organizations to sustain and build momentum in the struggle to eliminate child labour should be maintained, particularly with Albanian NGOs that work to protect children’s rights;

The following actions are needed

  1. teachers – raising awareness of all the teachers on the importance of being active in the fight against child drop out. 
  2. Conducting researches on child labour in the different sectors (researches done or supervised by Federations)
  3. Cooperation with IPEC and NGOs: not only participating in round tables but implement concrete actions together, coordinate our activities, etc.
  4. Media: we need to get more coverage by Albanian medias regarding every issue linked to child labour, a better quantitative and qualitative coverage.
  5. Actively raise the issue in the tripartite bodies. Government authorities and employers have a key responsibility in the fight against child labour. We have to pressure them more to make them act in accordance with the importance of children for the future of our country.
  6. Vocational training for children who have dropped out or are in difficulties, with children at risk.
  7. Cooperating with labour inspections to denounce employers who employ children, and with other authorities or partners to help the children identified at work.
  8. Organizing and promoting collective bargaining in private sector
  9. Struggle against informal sector
  10. Create a monitoring committee on child labour. This committee could for instance coordinate or implement in-depth researches on child labour in Albania, distribute promotion material on child labour (flyers, leaflets, posters, etc.)
  11. Pressure on European and international employers – cooperation with respective national centres and international trade unions.
  12. Continue having the child labour issue at the government agenda.
  13. Have the child labour issue at the Memorandum of Understanding (already draft) between Trade Unions – Government – Business.
  14. Have the child labour issue at the Charter of TU Congresses.