This record is a partial extract of the original cable. The full text of the original cable is not available.

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 04 TEGUCIGALPA 002916 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR DRL/IL (GWHITE), WHA/PPC, WHA/EPSC, AND WHA/CEN 
DOL FOR ILAB (TFAULKNER) 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: ELAB EIND ETRD PHUM SOCI HO USAID
SUBJECT: CHILD LABOR IN HONDURAS: INFORMATION FOR THE TRADE 
AND DEVELOPMENT ACT (GSP) REPORTING REQUIREMENT 
 
REF: A. STATE 168607 
     ¶B. TEGUCIGALPA 944 
     ¶C. 01 TEGUCIGALPA 3993 
     ¶D. 01 TEGUCIGALPA 2359 
     ¶E. 01 TEGUCIGALPA 2091 
 
¶1. Summary.  Over the past several months, Labor Attache and 
other EmbOffs have spoken with government officials, private 
sector, labor unions, non-governmental organizations, and 
child advocates regarding the situation of child labor in 
Honduras.  The Embassy has been active in promoting an agenda 
to support the eradication of the worst forms of child labor. 
 We believe that child labor is a serious issue in Honduras 
and will continue to pressure government and private sector 
stakeholders to eradicate the worst forms of child labor. 
The Government of Honduras (GOH) and the Ministry of Labor 
have demonstrated the political will necessary to implement 
and uphold their obligations to eliminate the worst forms of 
child labor.  Answers below generally follow the subjects 
specified in ref A.  End Summary. 
 
----------------------- 
CHILD LABOR IN HONDURAS 
----------------------- 
 
¶2. Honduran Government officials, International Labor 
Organization officials, and human rights organizations 
estimate that approximately 400,000 children work illegally 
in Honduras, the majority for their own families, in the 
informal sector, and in rural areas.  Many of these children 
work out of economic necessity alongside other family 
members.  Bonded and/or enslaved labor is rare, but work in 
hazardous conditions and for long hours is common, especially 
for those children who have given up schooling.  The 
U.S.-funded and International Labor Organization-managed 
International Program on the Elimination of Child Labor 
(IPEC) identified the worst forms of child labor in Honduras 
as prostitution (particularly in tourist areas along the 
North Coast), fireworks industry workers in Copan, child 
divers in lobster boats in the Mosquitia (Caribbean coast), 
limestone quarry and lime production workers, garbage dump 
pickers in the two large cities of Tegucigalpa and San Pedro 
Sula, and coffee and melon agricultural workers.  Of these 
occupations, the most hazardous is diving, and the one with 
the most significant incidence of child labor is in the melon 
industry, where NGOs and the GOH have estimated that 
approximately 2,000 children work as seasonal laborers (ref 
E).  Harvesting sugar cane fields is also a dangerous area of 
child labor. 
 
-------------------------------------- 
PROSCRIBING WORST FORMS OF CHILD LABOR 
-------------------------------------- 
 
¶3. Honduras has adequate laws and regulations proscribing the 
worst forms of child labor.  The Honduran Congress ratified 
ILO Convention 182 in May 2001 and Honduras became a party to 
the convention in June 2001.  The definition of the worst 
forms of child labor are identical to that of the ILO 
Convention 182.  All child labor laws, including the ILO 
Convention 182, are applicable in all sectors and industries. 
 
¶4. Honduras regulates child labor in the Constitution and in 
two codes, one relating to minors, and the other to labor. 
The Constitution (Chapter 5, article 128, section 7) 
establishes that minors who are under age 16 or who are 
students ages 16 and older cannot work.  The Constitution 
also establishes the maximum hours worked for children under 
17 years as six hours daily and 30 hours weekly.  Under the 
Child and Adolescent Code, a law passed in 1996, parents or a 
legal guardian can request the Ministry of Labor for special 
permission to allow children ages 14-15 to work, as long as 
the Ministry of Labor performs a home study to assure that 
the child both shows the need to work and will be working 
under non-hazardous conditions.  The work day proscribed for 
children is four hours per day for 14-15 year-olds, and six 
hours per day for 16-17 year-olds.  No minor is allowed to 
work in hazardous conditions.  In law and in practice, the 
Ministry of Labor carries out the home studies and limits the 
number of permits that children ages 14-15 can have.  The 
Labor Code, passed in 1959 and subsequently revised, 
prohibits night work and extra hours for minors under age 16, 
and also requires that employers in areas with more than 20 
school-aged children on their farm, ranch, or business must 
provide a location for a school.  In practice, many children 
work without going to the Ministry of Labor to request a 
permit, particularly those who work in the informal sector 
and in rural areas. 
¶5. International treaties have a status superior to that of 
the Constitution.  Honduras is a party to ILO Convention 138, 
which was ratified in 1980.  It establishes the minimum age 
of work at 14 years and specifies the age for completing 
educational requirements at 15 years.  The United Nations 
Convention on the Rights of Children, ratified by Honduras in 
1990, requires each signatory government to establish a 
minimum age of work, conditions and hours of work, and 
penalties to assure effective application of the law.   The 
above-mentioned Child and Adolescent Code was developed out 
of the UN Convention, according to Ministry of Labor sources. 
 
¶6. Honduran law defines hazardous work to include: standing 
on scaffolding higher than three meters; use of toxic or 
noxious substances; exposure to vehicular traffic; exposure 
to abnormal temperatures; work in tunnels or underground 
mining; exposure to noise louder than 80 decibels; 
manipulation of radioactive substances; exposure to high 
voltage electric currents; underground diving; exposure to 
garbage or to biological or pathogenic substances; painting 
with industrial or lead paint; work on dangerous machines 
such as those that cut, shape, or file metal or wood; 
activities related to ovens, smelters, metal-working, or 
heavy presses; or high risk agroindustrial work. 
 
¶7. The minimum age for employment is consistent with the age 
for completing educational requirements in law, but in 
practice, more than sixty percent of children do not complete 
sixth grade, despite GOH increased spending on educational 
budgets and improvement to school access in rural areas. 
 
----------------------------------------- 
IMPLEMENTATION AND ENFORCEMENT MECHANISMS 
----------------------------------------- 
 
¶8. In urban areas, these laws and regulations regarding child 
labor are better implemented than in rural areas.  A rural 
economy in which a significant portion of employment is in 
the informal sector and in which parents face high 
opportunity costs to send children to school makes it 
difficult to implement and enforce these measures against 
child labor.  In large scale manufacturing and services, 
however, implementation and enforcement of these measures are 
more consistent.  National enforcement remedies are not 
adequate to punish or deter violations, but pressure from 
international agreements, such as the Generalized System of 
Preferences (GSP) and Caribbean Basin Trade Partnership Act 
(CBTPA), and awareness of the U.S. Customs Forced Child Labor 
program, have sensitized employers who work in the export 
sector. 
 
¶9. Regarding the worst forms of child labor, the GOH has not 
yet established enforcement or penalties beyond those 
mentioned above and - for child labor in illicit activities - 
in the criminal code.  Penalties imposed on firms for 
violating the Child and Adolescent Code include sanctions 
between 303 and 1,515 USD (5,000-25,000 Lempiras), or twice 
that if the employer is a repeat offender.  For sale or 
trafficking of children, the criminal code prohibits illegal 
detention of minors and imposes a 14-18 year prison sentence. 
 Forced child labor, prostitution, and other immoral 
activities are characterized as economic exploitation in the 
Child and Adolescent Code and are subject to a three to five 
year prison term.  Furthermore, the criminal code specifies a 
seven to 12 year sentence, and a 455 to 909 USD (7,500-15,000 
Lempira) fine for persons found guilty of prostituting 
minors.  Forced recruitment and obligatory military service 
were abolished under a Constitutional amendment in 1997. 
Adults who use children in narcotrafficking are sanctioned 
according to the Law on the Illicit Use and Trafficking of 
Psychotropic Drugs. 
 
¶10. In theory, if children are found to be working in illicit 
conditions, either through a labor inspection or through a 
police investigation, the Special Prosecutors' Office on 
Children, founded in 1997, works with the investigative 
police to uncover evidence and bring the perpetrators to 
trial.  The judicial branch has also established Children 
Courts, where violations of children's rights are tried.  In 
practice, the Honduran police and judicial system are rife 
with inefficiencies and corruption and face many difficulties 
in administering justice.  Nonetheless, the GOH has improved 
its police force and recently implemented a new modern 
criminal procedures code that is intended to improve the 
Government's ability to bring cases to trial and to 
administer justice. 
 
¶11. For children employed in the worst forms of child labor 
that are not illicit by their nature but are hazardous or 
illegal for minors, the authority that would investigate such 
cases is the Ministry of Labor, which has trained inspectors 
to identify child labor.  Labor inspectors, upon being told 
of a violation or in a routine inspection, would report the 
incident for administrative action.  The inspection unit 
cannot immediately sanction employers, and the Ministry has 
less than 50 inspectors in a country of six million people. 
Note:  Like most government ministries, a severe lack of 
resources restricts what the MOL is able to accomplish.  End 
Note.  Despite these problems, in 2001, the MOL re-opened a 
regional office and re-initiated inspections of lobster boats 
in the Mosquitia region, where boat captains illegally employ 
boy divers.  The MOL also cooperated with the Honduran 
Private Business Council (COHEP) to launch an education 
campaign among private industries that increases business 
awareness of the worst forms of child labor in September 
¶2001.  Early in 2001 the Minister of Labor personally 
directed a special inspection of the melon industry in order 
to uncover the incidence of abuse in the sector.  In March 
Minister German Leitzelar visited Choluteca to observe the 
problems of child labor in the melon and sugar cane 
industries. 
 
--------------------- 
WHAT DOES THE GOH DO? 
--------------------- 
 
¶12. The Government provides free, universal, and compulsory 
education through the age of 13; however, the Government 
estimated that as many as 65,000 children ages 6 through 12 
fail to receive schooling of any kind each year; of these, 
almost 10,000 will never attend primary school.  A number of 
social and educational programs exist that are intended to 
reach children at risk for working instead of attending 
school.  A school grant program run by the Ministry of 
Education (MOE) provides very poor families with money for 
school supplies.  The MOE also provides alternative schooling 
by radio and long-distance learning for children in distant 
rural areas with few schools.  Regional committees of "Child 
Defense" volunteers try to convince parents to send their 
children to school.  Nonetheless, extreme poverty, recent 
famine in rural areas, and lack of jobs for grade school and 
high school graduates create an atmosphere where government 
incentives or programs have not yet stemmed the flow of 
children working. 
 
¶13. The National Commission for the Gradual and Progressive 
Eradication of Child Labor, established by decree by former 
President Carlos Flores in 1998 and maintained by current 
President Ricardo Maduro (who swore in a new commission in 
May), provides a tripartite working group in which civil 
society (including the ILO, unions, and non-governmental 
organizations), employer groups, and a number of government 
ministries have been able to discuss child labor issues over 
the past several years.  The Commission created a social 
dialogue and forum for negotiation between the groups, 
resulting in broad support for the ratification of ILO 
Convention 182, the development of a National Action Plan for 
the Gradual and Progressive Eradication of Child Labor, and 
the Regulations on the Worst Forms of Child Labor, which were 
drafted by the Commission and passed by Congress in December 
¶2001.  (Note:  In Honduras, Congress passes a law, the 
President signs the law, the executive branch drafts 
implementing regulations, and then Congress must pass the 
regulations for them to take effect.  This cumbersome process 
is a factor in the inability of successive administrations to 
update many outdated labor regulations.  End Note.) 
Furthermore, the Commission spawned seven inter-institutional 
sub-committees throughout the country that work in a 
tripartite fashion to develop strategies to eliminate child 
labor in Honduras.  Maduro's impressive Minister of Labor, 
German Leitzelar - a labor lawyer by profession (see ref B), 
has continued to increase the ministry's work combating child 
labor. 
 
¶14. The MOL also signed a Memorandum of Understanding with 
the ILO in 1997 to support the ILO IPEC program, which 
initiated program activities in the melon and coffee sectors. 
 The MOL also established its own office on the Gradual and 
Progressive Eradication of Child Labor. 
 
¶15. The Department of Labor (through ILO/IPEC) and USAID, as 
well as UNICEF, support several projects to promote the 
eradication of the worst forms of child labor, including by 
promoting school attendance.  In general these projects aim 
to remove children from or prevent children from exploitative 
work, and aim to provide educational opportunities and social 
services for children and their families.  See septel for a 
list of technical assistance on labor issues from 
international donors, including projects combating child 
labor. 
------- 
COMMENT 
------- 
 
¶16.  The GOH and the MOL have actively demonstrated the 
political will and found the resources to combat the child 
labor problem.  The industry group, COHEP, has recently 
showed renewed vigor to participate in the tripartite 
commission and to educate its own members on the importance 
of adhering to the ILO Convention 182.  We note that this 
reawakened commitment came on the heels of the July 17-18, 
2001 visit of the USTR-led interagency delegation to Honduras 
to discuss labor conditions.  The delegation determined that 
the situation in Honduras did not warrant opening a review of 
CBTPA benefits (ref D).  The U.S. Embassy continues to work 
with the government, NGOs, and the private sector to send the 
message that the worst forms of child labor are detrimental 
to business with the U.S. and could subject offending sectors 
to U.S. sanctions.  In addition, strong Honduran interest in 
a possible U.S.-Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) 
is clearly a motivating factor for the GOH and the private 
sector to accelerate efforts to eradicate the worst forms of 
child labor.  In sum, Post believes that the GOH is making 
continual progress toward the elimination of the worst forms 
of child labor.  End Comment. 
PALMER