VZCZCXYZ0011
OO RUEHWEB

DE RUEHAN #1216/01 3371349
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
O 031349Z DEC 07
FM AMEMBASSY ANTANANARIVO
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 0741
RUEHC/DEPT OF LABOR WASHDC IMMEDIATE

UNCLAS ANTANANARIVO 001216 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPT FOR AF/E MBEYZEROV AND DRL/IL TDANG 
LABOR FOR DOL/ILAB TMCCARTER 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: ELAB EIND ETRD PHUM SOCI USAID PREL MA CN
SUBJECT: WORST FORMS OF CHILD LABOR UPDATE: MADAGASCAR AND 
COMOROS 
 
REF: STATE 158223 
 
¶1.  Post provides below updated information on the Worst 
Forms of Child Labor in Madagascar and the Union of the Comoros, 
keyed to questions in reftel, as available and appropriate. 
 
¶2.  Madagascar 
-------------- 
 
The Government of Madagascar continues to be a regional leader in 
combating child labor and trafficking in persons, including policies 
to target the worst forms of child labor like gemstone mining and 
sex tourism. 
 
--  Questions A:  There were laws to protect children from 
exploitation in the workplace and prohibit forced or compulsory 
labor.  The minimum age for employment was 15 years of age, 
consistent with educational requirements.  The law allows children 
to work a maximum of eight hours per day and 40 hours per week with 
no overtime.  The law prohibits persons under the age of 18 from 
working at night and at sites where there is an imminent danger to 
health, safety, or morals.  Employers must observe a mandatory 
12-hour period between shifts.  Occupational health and safety 
restrictions include parental authorization and a medical visit 
before hiring. 
 
--  Questions A:  While already having laws to implement Convention 
182, the government adopted a decree July 3 regulating the working 
conditions of children, defining the worst forms of child labor, 
identifying penalties for employers, and establishing the 
institutional framework for its implementation. 
 
--  Questions A:  In August, the government adopted a new law 
prohibiting all forms of violence against children, including sexual 
exploitation and punishment of adult exploiters of child 
prostitutes.  In December, the government is prepared to send a 
draft law to the Parliament for approval that defines child sexual 
exploitation, child sex tourism, child pornography and trafficking 
in persons and stipulates sanctions for the authors of such crimes, 
particularly when committed against children. 
 
--  Questions B:  The Ministry of Labor's National Committee for the 
Fight Against Child Labor (CNLTE), composed of high-level 
government, donor, civil society, and religious group 
representatives, is the government's designated authority to 
implement child labor laws and policy.  The CNLTE is supported by 
counterpart agencies at the regional level.  To address child labor 
violations, government agencies can resort to legal remedies 
including criminal penalties and civil fines.  The Ministry of Civil 
Services and Labor is responsible for enforcing child labor laws and 
policies in the formal sector and conducted general workplace 
inspections during the year in response to a range of complaints, 
not all related to child labor.  The Ministry had only 77 inspectors 
to carry out its responsibilities, making it difficult to monitor 
and enforce child labor provisions effectively.  Enforcement in the 
much larger informal sector remained a serious problem. The Ministry 
of Civil Services and Labor was unable to provide statistics on the 
number of child-related investigations conducted, as there is no 
central database to collect such information. 
 
-- Questions B:  In July in collaboration with UNICEF, the 
government completed a one-year program to train and assist security 
forces in the protection of children.  The government's 
establishment of Regional Committees to Combat Child Labor (CRLTE) 
(see answers to Question C) throughout the country include training 
for responsible local authorities. 
 
--  Questions C:  During the year the government continued its 
efforts to combat forced child labor and trafficking.  The Ministry 
of Civil Services and Labor continued to implement its 15-year 
national plan to combat the worst forms of child labor, including 
prostitution.  CNLTE's major activities revolved around mass 
awareness raising campaigns regarding the worst forms of child 
labor, the importance of education, and raising awareness among all 
stakeholders.  The celebration of the World Day against Child Labor 
in seven regions around the island was the focal point for these 
activities.  In addition to the existing CRLTE in the north, the 
government established two additional CRLTEs in the southwest and 
east.  In May, the Ministries of Civil Services and Labor and 
Finance, supported by the International Labor Organization's 
Statistical Information and Monitoring Program on Child Labor 
(SIMPOC) and UNICEF, launched a national survey on child labor and 
trafficking to better address child exploitation issues.  As part of 
the ongoing "red card campaign" to raise awareness about the fight 
against child labor, the government worked with the Malagasy Soccer 
Federation to conduct awareness campaigns in Majunga in February and 
in Sambava in May. 
 
-- Questions C:  The government's Welcome Centers in Antananarivo, 
 
Tamatave, and Tulear continued to rescue victims of worst forms of 
child labor and trafficking.  Victims receive remedial education to 
assist their reinsertion into schools or vocational training, as 
well as counseling on how to avoid becoming a victim again.  After 
children are returned to their families, the centers continue to 
monitor their family and community environment.  Since the first 
center started operating in 2001, approximately 200 child workers 
have benefited from education and training at the centers. 
 
-- Questions C: The government worked closely in collaboration with 
the International Program for the Elimination of Child Labor (IPEC), 
largely funded by the U.S. Department of Labor, to validate its 
action plans and ensure they align with Madagascar's national action 
plan.  Under this partnership, 16 NGO-implemented programs are 
underway to rescue and rehabilitate child workers by inserting 
children in to the formal education system and providing vocational 
training.  Local officials also participated in IPEC-organized 
stakeholders' workshops around the country to combat child labor by 
identifying intervention strategies and partners. 
 
-- Questions C:  The Ministry of Health, in collaboration with the 
UN Children's Fund (UNICEF), operated over 14 multi-sector networks 
throughout the country to handle individual cases of child 
exploitation, including child labor and trafficking. 
 
-- Questions D:  The Ministry of Civil Services and Labor is several 
years into its 15-year national plan to combat the worst forms of 
child labor, and the CNLTE is the GOM's designated authority to 
implement child labor laws and policy.  In October, the government 
launched a consultative process along with a number of implementing 
partners to draft a national action plan against all kinds of 
violence against children, include child labor, sexual exploitation, 
and trafficking, to cover the period from 2008 to 2012.  This plan 
is expected to be finalized in mid-December.  Also, reduction of 
child labor is mentioned as one of the government's main goals in 
the comprehensive five-year Madagascar Action Plan (MAP) guiding the 
country's development. 
 
-- Questions D:  The constitution provides for tuition-free public 
education for all citizen children and makes primary education until 
age 14 compulsory.  According to a 2004 World Bank study, 68 percent 
of primary school-age children were enrolled.  Children in rural 
areas generally studied through middle school, whereas children in 
urban areas more often continued through the baccalaureate 
examination process for entrance into university.  Girls and boys 
had the same access to education. 
 
-- Questions E: Reliable statistics on the extent and nature of 
child labor and trafficking will not be available until the 
completion of the SIMPOC/UNICEF-funded national survey on child 
labor and trafficking issues in 2008.  However, the Household Survey 
of 2000 indicated that approximately 33 percent of the child 
population between the ages of seven and 17 were child laborers on a 
full or part-time basis.  Children in rural areas worked mostly on 
subsistence family farms and as cattle herders, while those in urban 
areas worked in occupations such as domestic laborers, transport of 
goods by rickshaw, petty trading, prostitution, stone quarrying, 
working in bars, and begging. Children were engaged in salt 
production, fishing, deep sea diving, and in the shrimp industry. 
The Ministry of Civil Services and Labor estimated that more than 
19,000 children were working in mines, mostly in Ilakaka in the 
south.  Children were trafficked internally for the purposes of 
forced labor and sexual exploitation. 
 
-- Questions E:  There were reports that persons were trafficked 
within the country.  The vast majority of cases involved children 
and young women, mostly from rural areas, trafficked for domestic 
servitude, prostitution, forced mining, and forced labor for 
traveling vendors.  A sex tourism problem existed in coastal cities, 
as well as the capital city of Antananarivo, with a significant 
number of children being exploited as prostitutes. International 
trafficking was rare, with unconfirmed anecdotal reports of a 
limited number of women and girls trafficked for prostitution to the 
neighboring islands of Mauritius and Reunion. 
 
¶3.  Union of the Comoros 
------------------------ 
 
-- Questions A:  Child prostitution and child pornography are 
illegal. The law considers unmarried children under the age of 18 as 
minors, and they are protected legally from sexual exploitation, 
prostitution, and pornography. There were no statistics regarding 
these matters, but they were not considered serious problems.  The 
law does not prohibit trafficking in persons; however, there were no 
reports that persons were trafficked to, from, or within the 
country. The law defines 15 as the minimum age for employment, but 
the government did not always enforce this law. 
 
-- Questions B:  Because of a lack of inspectors, the government 
 
does not enforce legal provisions that address the rights and 
welfare of children.  The government did not actively enforce child 
labor laws, nor was it active in seeking to prevent illegal child 
labor. 
 
-- Questions C:  Since his election in May 2006, President Ahmed 
Abdallah Sambi has made education and children's welfare top policy 
priorities.  However the government's persistent lack of resources 
and capacity means little tangible progress has been made in these 
areas.  The government mostly allows international agencies to 
conduct this work. 
 
-- Questions D:  Education is free and compulsory for children below 
the age of 16, but the government rarely provided public school 
education for children past the age of 14. According to UNICEF, 31 
percent of children attended elementary school between 1996 and 
¶2004. Boys generally had greater access to schools than did girls. 
 
-- Questions E:  Children usually worked in subsistence farming and 
fishing. Some families placed their children in the homes of 
wealthier families where they worked in exchange for food, shelter, 
or educational opportunities. 
 
-- For more details on child labor in the Comoros, Post suggests 
referring to the Department of Labor-funded comprehensive study on 
child labor in the Comoros conducted by Riziki Djabir in mid-2007, 
which should be available from the Department of Labor. 
 
MARQUARDT