Small hands, big burdens: Child labour in supply chains

Every day, 14-year-old Reena (name changed) spends hours clearing and delayering mica in the mines of Jharkhand. An entire day's toil, alongside her brother and mother, brings the family little more than Rs 150 in total.

Scraping through the rocks for mica with her bare hands, Reena has injured herself several times. Yet, unable to afford her education and their daily needs, her family remains dependent on this dangerous work.

"There was no other option for me. We have to work in the mines for our survival. I injured myself many times in the process,” says Reena.

Even though the origins of mica are bloodied, at the other end of the supply chain, it is a highly sought-after mineral. Mica adds glitter to paint pigments, cosmetics and even electronics. Just last year, the famous cosmetics brand Fenty Beauty, belonging to international singer Rihanna, came under scrutiny by the National Commission For Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) for sourcing mica without supply chain clearance certification, allegedly from mines where children work in dire conditions.

With some researchers estimating that about 60 per cent of the world's supply of mica comes from the illegal mines of Jharkhand and Bihar, it is likely that numerous name brands are participating in an exploitative system that employs and harms children like Reena.

Due to the informal nature of the mica supply chain's origins in Jharkhand, wages are extremely low, and the standards of safety, are even lower. Most commonly performed without any protective gear, the work involves serious risks, including suffocation in the mining shafts and severe health impacts such as tuberculosis and skin infections.

Mica is only one, and a glaring example, of the hidden, harmful impact of several global supply chains. According to 2022 data from the United States Department of Labour, various global exports, including silk and cotton, involve the exploitation of children as labourers.

Due to the increasing complexity of global supply chains, with the involvement of middlemen, traders and corporations, this hidden harm of child labour has only become more difficult to identify.

At the consumption level, users remain unaware of exploitative practices. In the case of mica, for example, “many companies simply claim that their product comes from legitimate sources that do not involve child labour, even though it actually comes from the illegal mines in Jharkhand where children are forced to work,” says a programme officer who works with a non-profit in Jharkhand to rescue and rehabilitate children in vulnerable situations.

Global brands contract manufacturing processes out to smaller companies. Since most of these bigger corporations are transnational in nature, they are able to distance themselves from both, the impacts and consequences of the employment of children.

At the domestic level, this is exacerbated by laxity in the implementation of anti-child labour legislation. Data from the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) shows that in 2020, only 705 child labourers were rescued, based on 476 First Information Reports that were registered under the Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act.

Exploitation of children plagues almost all supply chains, from agriculture to electronics. India, a top exporter of garments, sees a growth in production levels every year. This is a worrying trend for child labourers, considering that in 2014, 2,00,000 children under 14 were working on cotton farms, with the number increasing over time.

Beyond manufacturing, the services sector also depends on child labourers. In June alone, the NCPCR raided 75 automobile repair shops and found children working in many of them. “We ended up filing 250 FIRs, and found children in an authorised shop of a major Indian automobile brand,” says NCPCR chairperson Priyank Kanungo.

Underlying causes

In most cases, child labour persists in regions which perform poorly across socio-economic indicators including education, employment and income. Such circumstances have resulted in communities viewing children as contributors to household income. This means that even when children are working, they are thought to be ‘helping’ the family. “One child might graze the family’s cow, but the milk goes into the supply chain. While on the surface it does not look like child labour as the child is helping with household chores, at a larger scale it is definitely part of the supply chain,” says Vasudeva Sharma of Child Rights Trust, Bengaluru.

Over the years, child labour has evolved to more discreet forms including informal, home-based manufacturing units. “Take the case of beedi, factories have become godowns now. The raw material is supplied to homes which have become manufacturing units where children work,” he adds.

Venkat Reddy, of the Hyderabad-based MV Foundation, cites that textile, granite mining, carpet and shoe industries are sectors that employ children in large numbers. “The whole process is an informal one, distributed across a wide household network, where children make textiles or shoes. In a scenario like this, identification of a particular company or a brand to take them to task is difficult, especially when the entire family is involved in the labour,” says Reddy.

Weighed down by the physical and mental stresses of child labour, young boys and girls are employed at the cost of their childhoods, as well as their futures. Sharma explains, “Even children who do not drop out entirely, miss classes and do not attend school regularly. This affects their learning outcomes.”

In 2018, the National Sample Survey Office found that 32 million children remain out of school in India. Across sectors and regions, the pandemic has worsened the situation. “Children could not access education for two years. Many started working and dropped out of the system completely,” says Enakshi Ganguly, co-founder of HAQ: Centre for Child Rights. She pointed at a study conducted by Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy which estimated that 43 per cent of children dropped out of school during this time. Ati (15) (name changed), who was formerly employed in Jharkhand’s mines, for example, had to drop out of school and work during the pandemic due to financial constraints.

Explaining the structural gaps, the programme officer says, “there is a lack of basic infrastructure for education and alternative livelihoods. Close to 45 per cent of districts in Jharkhand where child labour exists have low coverage of anganwadi centres for primary and pre-primary education.”

Independent efforts to tackle the problem through multi-pronged approaches that focus on alternative opportunities at the family and community levels have proved effective. However, a one-dimensional approach to preventing child labour — failing to address the root causes that lead to the employment of children — is inadequate.

“Most rural centres lack facilities and administrative support for carrying out drives to check child labour. There are very few institutions where children can be housed and provided education. Similarly, the families must be provided employment support if we really want them not to send their children to work,” says Rafiqul Islam, a child rights activist in Barpeta in western Assam.

‘Safe work’

The Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act 1986 prohibits the engagement of children in “all occupations”. The Act considers anyone below the age of 14 to be a child. The Act, which was amended in 2016, now allows children below 14 to work in family businesses which are non-hazardous. It added a caveat that working hours should be limited to after school or during vacations.

Some are of the view that in a socio-economic context where adolescents entering the workforce appears to be an eventuality, ensuring safe occupations alongside education is essential. The root causes of child labour can simultaneously be addressed. Kavita Ratna from The Concerned for Working Children, says, “It is the state’s responsibility to protect all rights of working adolescents. Ensuring safe occupations with good future prospects, coupled with education options as provisioned by the law, can protect adolescents from exploitative work and danger.”

However, others point out that in practice, protective measures fall short or do not exist. Shantha Sinha, former chairperson of the NCPCR, says, “Children are not supposed to work during school hours. It is the job of the labour department and child protection units to ensure that children are in school. There is a total collapse of institutional mechanisms to identify children at work and get them back to school.”

Due diligence

In a world where brands are conscious of public perception, they face external pressure to present a clean image. However, behind this surface-level projection lies the reality that exploitative practices are perpetuated in the supply chains they create and utilise.

When global censure is the driving force behind holding brands accountable, supply chains will continue to depend on child labour.

Purva Gupta of Global March Against Child Labour, a Kailash Satyarthi initiative, says that new labour legislations in the European Union could go a long way in compelling brands to do their due diligence in keeping children out of manufacturing processes.

However, domestic and international legislation that regulates every level of the supply chain is the need of the hour.

Once such policies are in place, effective implementation is at the core of ensuring they translate into reality. Yet, without a multi-pronged approach that addresses a lack of alternative livelihoods, poverty and education inequity, child labour will continue to steal childhoods from children.

(With inputs from Amrita Madhukalya in New Delhi, Sumir Karmakar in Guwahati, Anitha Pailoor, Varsha Gowda and Sweekruthi K in Bengaluru)