The Asutifi South District Assembly in the Ahafo region is courting the support of stakeholders to help curb the upsurge of child labor in the area.
Four out of 10 children in the area are found to be engaged in a form of child labour, especially in illegal mining and farming activities.
The local Assembly has taken steps in drafting an anti-child labor by-law to protect children from the menace.
The Asutifi South district, which shares a boundary with Ahafo Ano North in the Ashanti region, is an agrarian and mining enclave.
Children are exploited in the booming illegal mining operations as well as farming activities.
This has been the practice for the last 15 years as authorities struggle to bring the situation under control, though the local assembly has rolled out education initiatives.
District Chief Executive, Robert Dwomoh, has bemoaned the involvement of children in illegal mining at the expense of their education due to farming and mining activities.
Asutifi South District being an agrarian district, that means we do a lot of farming and unfortunately for us, for the past 15-years, we’ve also been mining so there are mining communities. And generally, where you find these two occupations, child labour is bound to happen. We’ve been fighting against it; we’ve been educating them.”
Mr. Dwomoh who was speaking at the International Day Against Child Labour event organized by NGO, Nature Aid Ghana at Konkontreso, one of the endemic communities said it is common to see children working in the illegal mining sector.
Some of them, he said, has grown into adults as victims of child labour.
He is encouraging parents to take advantage of the government’s Free SHS programme to improve their lives.
He told journalists that the Assembly is drafting anti-child labor by-law to curb the menace which has since reduced.
“With the passage of the bye-law against child labor, I believe that the assembly itself can arrest people and prosecute them for that offences. The lawyers are drafting it,” he added.
Konkontreso is one of the child labor-endemic communities.
According to a not-for-profit organization, Nature Aid Ghana,A at least 4 out of every 10 children on the streets are victims of one form of child labour.
The organization has been busy supporting the efforts of the local assembly to help change the narrative.
Officials, through the formation of community child support committees, are working with parents, educational institutions, and traditional authorities to change the situation.
Joseph Baradoe is the Executive Director of Nature Aid Ghana.
“We conducted research and data shows that this area in particular, when you pick about 10 children, you get at least not less than 3 or 4 involved in child labor. We are actually helping the community to develop community action plans, trying to diagnose their own problems and then profess solutions to them,”
Parents are now more aware of the adverse impact of child labour in the area.