International conventions and agreements stress on the right of the child to be protected from economic exploitation and from performing any work that is likely to be hazardous or to interfere with the child's education, or to be harmful to the child's health or physical, mental, spiritual, moral or social development.
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IPEC is clear in setting its priorities to protect children from hazardous working conditions that might endanger them physically or morally, with an emphasis on the most vulnerable, such as the very young and girls.
CHILD Labor:
Child labor is work that is not acceptable because the children involved are too young and should be in school, or because even though they have attained the minimum age for admission to employment, the work that they do is unsuitable for a person below the age of 18, be it paid or unpaid work, within their families or outside.
Worst forms of child Labor:
Article 3 from the ILO Convention 182 defines “worst forms of child labor” such as bonded labor, slavery or practices similar to slavery, production and trafficking of drugs or other work which is likely to harm their health, safety or morals.
Action against child labour in Lebanon officially started at the national level in 2000, afterthrough the signature of an MOU between the Ministry of Labour and the ILO-IPEC Programme. Soon after Lebanon ratified the ILO C.182 (on Worst Forms of Child Labour) in 2001 and C.138 (on Minimum Age for Employment) in 2003 several projects followed in order to fulfill these Conventions’ Requirements at least partially. Furthermore, a National strategy Against Child Labour was developed and endorsed by Council of Ministers in 2005
These efforts led by the Ministry of Labour, in a full partnership with ILO led to a recent development of a pragmatic National Action Plan for the Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labour in 2013. This Plan defined 11 strategic priorities, which determine the road map to combat the worst forms of child labor in Lebanon by 2016 (in concordance with the Global Hague Conference on Child Labour).
The Lebanese government issued the Decree 8987 on 29th. of September 2012 prohibiting employment of children(under the age of 18) in works that may harm their health, safety or morals). This decree and related list of most hazardous work in Lebanon was developed on the basis of a study carried out by Ministry of Labour and the American University of Beirut (Public Health Department). It includes the most hazardous occupations and their related environmental risks (see….).
Eradication of the worst forms of child labor is included in the earlier mentioned broader National Action Plan, concluded recently after a set of expert group consultations, joining local stakeholders through the National Steering Committee Against Child labour (NSC) with international and regional experts, and was launched by His Excellency the President of the Republic of Lebanon, General Michel Sleiman on 7th. November 2013