Ukraine has 416,000 working children
That Ukraine became the first country in Eastern Europe and the CIS to organize statistical research of child labor testifies not only to the desire to solve the problem but also to a very large scale of the latter. According to official data, there are nine million children between the ages of 5 and 17, in Ukraine. The same data show that over 400,000 of them are working. One hardly need add that in reality this last figure is much higher.
It proceeds from the national concept that “the work (employment) of the children aged 5-17 is economic activity connected with the production of goods or provision of services of a market nature for monetary remuneration or in kind.” A research conducted by the State Statistics Committee, the International Labor Organization, and the Ministry of Labor found 416,000 children (156,000 girls and 260,000 boys) doing permanent, temporary, onetime, or household work for more than 24 hours a week. Every second child said he/she worked in unfavorable conditions. Moreover, one fourth of the 7-12 year-old children carried out hard physical work, while the work of 18% of the children imposed on them a higher-than-usual mental strain not adequate to their age.
Economic reasons were the main factor forcing children to work. Only 14% of them worked with a purpose of acquiring job skills. However, most children who said they worked to satisfy their personal needs also stated that the main reason was that their families were in dire straits. And finally, one-third worked without earning wages, helping their parents, or were paid in kind (mostly, in agriculture). It is characteristic that parents usually took a positive view of the fact that their children worked, although they reported two-thirds of the children had unsatisfactory or weakened health. Only one-third of the parents did not approve of their children’s work.
Of 350,000 children employed in the economy, those aged 15-17 and eligible by the national legislation to be employed made up over half. At the same time, 7-12 year-olds who are forbidden to work accounted for 24%. Agriculture, trade, and the service industry are the most typical fields for child labor. What is interesting is the relationship between the children and the employers: 82% of children were employed on the basis of an unsigned agreement (in this case, children earn quite little, as a rule: almost two-thirds received under 80 hryvnias a month, with one-third of the latter getting less than 40 hryvnias). If the recorded number of working children is to be supplemented with those working in private and family businesses (15%) and the self-employed (27%), one can conclude that a majority of children worked in the informal sector of the economy.
