Zehra K Bozai

Zehra K Bozai
English 102
26 Oct, 2009.

CHILD LABOR IN THIRD WORLD COUNTRIES HAS
A NEGATIVE EFFECT ON THE CHILDREN.

Child labor has very negative effects on children who work in harsh environments for a long time. Children at a young age are supposed to go to school and enjoy their youth. Instead, in many third world countries, children are forced to go to work, and they are even sometimes locked in rooms and chained by their employers. In countries like India and Pakistan or Bangladesh the rate of illiteracy is high and they have few numbers of adults in the family and most families have four to five children. In such types of circumstances, when there are few numbers of adults, poverty children are forced to work at a very young age. Sometimes they are also sold by their employers to Middle East countries.
I have seen child labor myself as I am from Pakistan where children at the age of five are forced to work in fruit markets or collect garbage from the streets. These children work in unhealthy environments in which they may catch dangerous diseases like tuberculosis. Parent sometimes sell their children to get money for their living. For instance, girls are forced into prostitution. By doing this work when they are supposed to enjoy their youth, children go through a rough time in their lives and may experience mental disorders and emotional traumas. Another reason why employers try to hire young children rather than adults is because child labor is cheap and children get paid little.
Child labor is also accompanied by high children deaths. The value of human life is nothing in third world countries. Child labor is also bonded labor where children under 18 years of age are taken away by land lords in exchange of their family’s debt and they have to work throughout their lives in an abusive environment. These children are forced to work long hours with little or sometimes no pay. In other words child labor destroys children labor. The governments of third world countries should take measures to stop child labor. They should educate people not to have too many children. For example, every family should have only two children that way it would be affordable for every family to take care of their children instead of sending them to work. If parents send their children to school, that should raise the literacy rate in third world countries. Then, later in the future, these countries should have qualified adults working instead of children working and supporting their families.