KARACHI, May 21: Despite assurances by successive governments regarding elimination of, or reduction in, child labour, and pledges of provision of both formal and non-formal education to these children, earning livelihood for their families, the number of children engaged in various forms of labour is touching 3.5 million in the country.

According to a survey, conducted by the Federal Bureau of Statistics, about 73 per cent of the workers (2.5 million) are boys and 27 per cent (950,000) are girls. About 2.1 million are in the 10-14 years age group, while the rest of them are between the age group of five and nine years.

A similar survey, conducted by the federal government, a few years back, had placed the number of child workers at approximately 3.1 million.

The latest survey concludes that more than 2.9 million children work in rural and 400,000 in the urban areas of the country, making the number of working children, in rural areas, more than seven times, than that of in the urban areas.

The labour-force-participation rate of children is 10.3 per cent in rural areas and 3.25 per cent in the urban areas of the country.

About 60 per cent (1.94 million) of these children are found in Punjab, followed by the NWFP, which has 1.06 million young workers, while Sindh has 298,000 and Balochistan has 14,000 child-workers, the survey report says.

The survey found that about 71 per cent of the total working children are engaged in elementary occupations, relating to agriculture, sales and services, mining, construction, manufacturing and transport sectors.

Crafts and related trade activities are the next major occupation, employing about 19 per cent working children. About 67 per cent of the employed children are in agriculture sector and 11 per cent work in manufacturing sector.

Other sectors, having a significant share of child labour, are wholesale and retail trades, community, social and domestic service (nine per cent), transport eight per cent, and storage and communications, four per cent.

The working-hours statistics show that about 46 per cent of the children have to work more than 35 hours a week, while 13 per cent work even more than 56 hours a week.

The survey says that seven per cent of the working children suffer from frequent illness and injuries, 28 per cent occasionally and 33 per cent rarely face these situations, adding that male children were found more prone to injuries than the female.

The survey report further reveals that about 70 per cent of the children work as unpaid family-helpers, followed by employees (23 per cent), and self-employed (seven per cent).

In rural areas, about 75 per cent of children worked as unpaid family helpers, while in urban areas the proportion was less than a third, the report said.

About a third of the working children are said to be literate. The male children are more educated than the female ones. The literacy rate among the working children is higher in the urban areas (42 per cent) than in the rural areas (32 per cent). About 54 per cent parents and guardians said they allowed their children to work since they needed assistance in household enterprise, while another 27 per cent stated that they needed the children to supplement their income resources.

The information provided by survey will help launch a programme for rehabilitation of working children.

The Bureau carried out a number of surveys in last few years to determine the extent and nature of child labour in brick-kilns, auto- workshops, steel furnaces, spare parts manufacturing, tanneries, textile sector, light engineering, surgical instruments, soccer ball stitching and hotels and restaurants.

In small industries, including carpet-making, about 7,000 children, making 17 per cent of the total work force employed in the industry, were engaged in stitching of footballs. About 90 per cent of them were boys, while about 87 per cent of them were literate.—PPI