Child labor in México

List of Goods Produced by Child Labor or Forced Labor

.

Child labor in México

Agriculture sector.

.

ILAB maintains a list of goods and their source countries which it has reason to believe are produced by child labor or forced labor in violation of international standards, as required under the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act (TVPRA) of 2005 and subsequent reauthorizations.

ILAB maintains the List primarily to raise public awareness about forced labor and child labor around the world and to promote efforts to combat them; it is not intended to be punitive, but rather to serve as a catalyst for more strategic and focused coordination and collaboration among those working to address these problems.

The great majority of Mexican farm exports to the United States come from agro-industrial complexes. Pressure from big U.S. retailers and the Mexican government has driven child labor out of these operations over the last decade.

http://graphics.latimes.com/product-of-mexico-children/

.

"En México, 3.6 millones de niños, niñas y adolescentes entre los 5 y 17 años de edad están trabajando de acuerdo al Módulo sobre Trabajo Infantil de la Encuesta Nacional de Ocupación y Empleo (ENOE 2007). Lo anterior equivale al 12,5% de la población infantil de este mismo rango de edad. De ellos, 1.1 millones son menores de 14 años; es decir, no han cumplido con la edad mínima para trabajar marcada por la Ley Federal del Trabajo. "

http://www.unicef.org/mexico

Development problem

Mexican law

Child labor tends to prevent children and teenagers from achieving full development, by limiting their human capital accumulation and reducing long-term income levels throughout the labor life cycle. In Mexico, child labor is even more important because education tends to have high private returns, leaving the uneducated population at a severe disadvantage. Likewise, these effects will likely extend to future generations, in light of Mexico's low social mobility. On the aggregate level, child labor is generally undesirable, as it reduces the human capital stock in the medium and long term, limiting future economic growth.

Article 123 of the Constitution of the United Mexican States stipulates that child labor under the age of 14 years is prohibited (CPEUM, Article 123, section A, clause III). In addition, the Federal Labor Law proclaims in Articles 22 and 23 that children under the age of 14 are not allowed to work in any case, and teens under age 16 that have not completed mandatory education are also prohibited from working, except in certain exceptional situations. However, despite the fact that there is a legal framework to prevent child labor, this cohort continues to work at significant levels. According to data from the Child Labor Module (MTI) (INEGI, 2012), 10.5% of the population aged 5 to 17 years worked in 2011. Of them, 70.9% were legally allowed to work, meaning that more than 882,000 individuals between the ages of 5 and 13 participated in the labor market.

Published in Mexico, 2005-2015 © D.R. Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM).

PROBLEMAS DEL DESARROLLO. REVISTA LATINOAMERICANA DE ECONOMÍA, Volume 47, Number 184, January-March 2016

Published in Mexico, 2005-2015 © D.R. Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM).

PROBLEMAS DEL DESARROLLO. REVISTA LATINOAMERICANA DE ECONOMÍA, Volume 47, Number 184, January-March 2016

The World Bank

.Children at Work in Mexico

United Nations

.Los Angeles Times Report

Children work the fields throughout Mexico's agricultural export regions. They pick tomatillos in Baja California and Michoacan and tomatoes in Zacatecas and San Luis Potosi. They de-stem strawberries in Baja California Sur. They bag coffee beans and cut sugar cane in Veracruz and Chiapas.

"An estimated 100,000 Mexican children under 14 pick crops for pay."

Who are the children that work?

There are almost twice as many children in the countryside that work than in the city. Also, more of them work in States like Guerrero, in the South, (where 12% of six-to-13-years-old work), than in Chihuahua, in the North (where only 1.4% of children work).

The older the child becomes, the more likely it is to drop school and start working. For example, a third of 17 year old Mexicans work.

Many kids who work go to school at the same time. This has consequences on their academic performance and on their health, especially if they are very young: they spend less time on their school activities, and less time resting or playing.

This means they are less likely to have a higher-paid, formal job in the future.

Child labour means work that is prohibited for children of certain age groups. It is work performed by children who are under the minimum age legally specified for that kind of work, or work which, because of its detrimental nature or conditions, is considered unacceptable for children and is prohibited. Today, throughout the world, around 215 million children work, many full-time. They do not go to school and have little or no time to play. Many do not receive proper nutrition or care. They are denied the chance to be children. More than half of them are exposed to the worst forms of child labour such as work in hazardous environments, slavery, or other forms of forced labour, illicit activities including drug trafficking and prostitution, as well as involvement in armed conflict.

http://graphics.latimes.com/product-of-mexico-children/

http://www.un.org/en/events/childlabourday/background.shtml

• http://www.worldbank.org/en/news/feature/2013/01/18/children-at-work-in-mexico-still-a-major-issue