Act now to end child labour: 2021 declared International Year for the Elimination of Child Labour

"COVID-19 has plunged the world into a crisis of unprecedented scope and scale. The harmful effects of this pandemic will not be distributed equally. They are expected to be most damaging in the poorest countries and in the poorest neighbourhoods, and for those in already disadvantaged or vulnerable situations, such as children in child labour and victims of forced labour and human trafficking, particularly women and girls," states the UN website on World Day Against Child Labour(June 12) observance coordinated by ILO and UNICEF.

The website adds, "Children around the world are routinely engaged in paid and unpaid forms of work that are not harmful to them. However, they are classified as child labourers when they are either too young to work, or are involved in hazardous activities that may compromise their physical, mental, social or educational development. In the least developed countries, slightly more than one in four children (ages 5 to 17) are engaged in labour that is considered detrimental to their health and development."

in India, the child labour problem is acute if one goes by the UN's information which goes as follows: "The Africa and the Asia and the Pacific regions together account for almost nine out of every ten children in child labour worldwide... Statistics on the absolute number of children in child labour in each national income grouping indicate that 84 million children in child labour, accounting for 56% of all those in child labour, actually live in middle-income countries, and an additional 2 million live in high-income countries."

The year 2021 has been declared as the International Year for the Elimination of Child Labour 'to reinvigorate efforts to achieve SDG Target 8.7 to end all forms of child labour by 2025.'