The Plight of Third World Child Laborers

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Recommended: impact of multinational corporations on third world countries

You wake up bright and early at 6:00 in the morning to the stark sound of factory alarms, after sleeping on the floor in a room inundated with people. Quickly, you head off to work in the dismal, rundown, sneaker or clothing sweatshop. You take your place on the line, receive your unattainable daily quota for production, and get to work. Conditions are deplorable and injuries are commonplace. Hours feel like centuries, as you work straight until 11 with only brief breaks for lunch and dinner. Unable to reach your production quota, you must stay longer to finish your daily production, or else pay the fines for uncompleted work. At the end of the day, your 10 year old body is in pain after a 14 hour day of hard labor. For this backbreaking work, you receive only pennies per hour. You then return to the tiny shack you call your home, along with 15 other child laborers. Sleep comes quick, but vanishes quicker, as night turns into day and your work begins all over again. This day repeats for 6 days a week, 28 days a month, 336 days a year. According to UNICEF, 158 million children are child laborers around the world, and live their lives like the one described above. Many major multinational companies, such as Nike and Gap, exploit these child laborers to produce cheaper products in a global market. This exploitation by major international companies is wrong, and should be put to a stop through means of international conventions and legislation.

As I previously stated, exploitation of children in third world countries is a major problem in the world today. In many developing countries, including India, Pakistan, Indonesia, and areas of Latin America, child labor constitutes a huge percentage of the country’s workforce. With most of ...

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...ion, these people are provided with an essential tool that can help them rise up against horrid working conditions, forever ending the exploitation of child laborers in third world countries.

Works Cited

Gentleman, Amelia. “Gap Moves to Recover from Child Labor Scandal.” New York Times, n.p.,

15 Nov 2007, Web, 31 May 2011.

Human Rights Watch. Children’s Rights. Human Rights Watch, 2011. Web. 31 May 2011.

International Labor Organization. Child Labor. International Labor Organization, 2011. Web. 1

June 2011.

Lane, Belize. Just Stop It: Nike, Gap Sweatshops Exploit Third-World Citizens. The Paly Voice,

2004. Web. 31 May 2011.

Philippe Laloux. Finding Solutions to Child Labor. Children’s Care International, 2000. Web. 31

May 2011.

UNICEF. Child Protection from Violence, Exploitation, and Abuse. UNICEF, 23 Feb 2011.

Web. 31 May 2011.

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