COTE D'IVOIRE'S UPDATE ON THE WORST FORMS OF CHILD

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 ABIDJAN 001219 SIPDIS SIPDIS DEPARTMENT OF LABOR FOR ILAB TINA MCCARTER STATE PASS TO USTR STATE FOR DRL TU DENG E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: ELAB EIND ETRD PHUM SOCI IV SUBJECT: COTE D'IVOIRE'S UPDATE ON THE WORST FORMS OF CHILD LABOR REF: A. SECSTATE 149662 ¶B. ABIDJAN 1180 ¶C. ABIDJAN 1084 ¶1. (U) Per reftel instructions, Post submits the following updated information on the elimination of the worst forms of child labor (WFCL) in Cote d'Ivoire. POC for this report is Economic Chief Ervin Massinga. A) Laws and Regulations Proscribing the Worst Forms of Child Labor -------------- ¶2. (U) Ivorian laws concerning WFCL have not changed since 2005, when the National Assembly's constitutional mandate expired. Since then, the country has depended on Presidential and Prime Ministerial decrees for new legislation, but this approach has not permitted many new legislative projects, and no new labor or trafficking in persons-related decrees have been promulgated since 2005. ¶3. (U) Ivorian law continues to set the minimum age for employment at 14 years. However, this law applies to the formal workplace, and not to the millions of small farms and informal businesses in rural and urban areas. Forced and compulsory labor continues to be prohibited under a 2005 governmental decree, as is hazardous work for persons under the age of 18. The minimum age for recruitment into the armed forces is 18; in 2007, for the first time, both the armed forces of the state of Cote d'Ivoire and the armed opposition "New Forces" have refrained from forcibly recruiting underage persons. ¶4. (U) The government has improved its enforcement of child trafficking laws. It continues to set up village-level watch committees as part of a child labor trafficking monitoring system. B) Regulations for the Implementation and Enforcement of Prescriptions Against the Worst Forms of Child Labor -------------- ¶5. (U) The government's Child Labor Task Force is implementing a national action plan to combat child labor and trafficking (reftel a). Nine government ministries are involved in the effort. The Ministry of Family and Social Affairs continues to conduct awareness campaigns targeting children at risk and agricultural regions that employ child labor, working in coordination with several international NGOs. ¶6. (U) Laws applying to child traffickers have not changed. While the law does not specifically prohibit trafficking in persons, traffickers may be prosecuted for kidnapping, mistreatment and/or torture of children. Punishments for such crimes range from one to five years imprisonment. "Alienation of a person's freedom" is punishable by five to ten years in prison, with the maximum penalty if the victim is under 15. Anyone found to have left or taken another person as a form of financial guarantee can be punished with a prison sentence of five years, and if someone is forced to perform labor against his/her will, the penalty is one to five years in prison. ¶7. Enforcement of such laws continues to be hindered. Budgeted resources devoted to programs are small, and international donors assistance levels are higher than those of the government itself. However, there are indications that training efforts by the government, often facilitated by resources provided by international donors, are having an effect. Local law enforcement officials and border police are reporting more successes in uncovering cross-border efforts to traffic children and are disrupting the associated trafficking networks. The government does not publish a comprehensive list or study of trafficking cases detected and prosecutions; news of such cases are reported through the press. C) Social Programs Designed to Prevent and Withdraw Children from the Worst Forms of Child Labor -------------- ¶8. (U) The government of Cote d'Ivoire cooperates with ILO-IPEC on the six-year, USD 9.25 million regional LUTRENA project designed to combat the trafficking of children for exploitative labor in West and Central Africa. The project aims to withdraw and prevent 9,000 children from trafficking situations in the region. Additional funding to the LUTRENA ABIDJAN 00001219 002 OF 002 project for Cote d'Ivoire specifically has aided the National Committee for Combating Trafficking and Child Exploitation, which has been in the lead in implementing programs in the field to detect trafficking of children. ¶9. (U) USAID and the international cocoa industry fund the Sustainable Tree Crops Program in Cote d'Ivoire. This public/private partnership promotes farmer education against using WFCL. Germany's development agency GTZ, along with a number of NGOs and corporations working independently, also have substantial programs designed to sensitize communities concerning WFCL. A group of international cocoa firms working together conducted a campaign in April that involved holding workshops to explain the damage done by WFCL; 11,500 cocoa farmers attended. D) Comprehensive Policy Aimed at the Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labor -------------- ¶10. (U) The government is in the midst of developing and implementing a nationwide program to monitor and combat the use of WFCL in at least 50 percent of the country, as outlined under the Harkin-Engle Protocol. The National Child Labor Task Force published a preliminary diagnostic plan (reftel c) which found 22 percent of children in a test area within the cocoa-growing regions are involved in cocoa production, and a majority of them (over 80 percent) are subjected to at least one form of WFCL (overwhelmingly carrying heavy loads). This finding is in line with previous reports on the subject. ¶11. (U) The Ministry of Labor has produced a National Plan of Action to combat WFCL (reftel b). The plan identifies a series of steps that must be accomplished, including strengthening the capacity of judges and law enforcement, reinforcing preventative action (sensitization campaigns) and the development of a plan to remove children from environments in which they are subjected to WFCL. The plan is budgeted at USD 7.2 million and aims to reduce the overall incidence of child labor (including but not exclusively WFCL) by 2011. ¶12. (U) The National Plan of Action and pilot diagnostic were published in September and November 30, 2007 respectively. The pilot diagnostic should be scaled up during the cocoa-harvest (December-March) to include 50 percent of the country's cocoa growing regions, and a complete diagnostic is to be published in the spring of 2008. ¶13. (U) Education is free through secondary school, but is not mandatory. In practice, however, school books, uniforms and lunch fees make schooling cost-prohibitive for many poor families. E) Is Cote d'Ivoire Making Continual Progress Towards Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labor? -------------- ¶14. (U) The most recent comprehensive surveys continue to be ones performed in 2002 and 2003. A preliminary study of efforts to monitor and eliminate WFCL, done by Tulane University's Payson Center (under a grant from the DOL) provided a partial snapshot of the multiple efforts to assess and end WFCL. In its preliminary report, the Payson Center found that the objective of certifying the cocoa industry as entirely free of WFCL unrealistic, given the 1-2 million small family cocoa farms involved in cocoa productions, the poverty of their owners, and the social acceptance of children working with or alongside their parents and other relatives. ¶15. (U) Anecdotal evidence from a number of U.S. and international NGOs indicate that sensitization efforts are having an impact. Farmers are aware of the deleterious effects of WFCL on children, and the incidence of such labor, aside from carrying heavy loads (which approximately 90 percent of children working in the cocoa industry do),is under 20 percent. NESBITT