Child labour has become in recent years an important concern in the global development agenda. Here in the Philippines, one of the more striking developments is the emergence of a strong social movement against child labour, which involves a wide range of programme partners from several sectors: government, employer, trade union, and non-governmental organizations. Together this movement is seeking to implement a comprehensive programme of action that substantiates the wide body of laws that the Philippine government has passed on child protection. A notable achievement of this movement is the recent (1997) ratification of the ILO Convention on the Minimum Age of Employment.
At the onset of the ILO's International Program on the Elimination of Child Labour (IPEC) programme in the Philippines in 1994, only a handful of government and non-government agencies were focusing on the issues of child labour, in particular on children in the more invisible and hazardous forms of work. Even then, the Kamalayan Development Center is one of the very few organizations taking the lead in exposing the intolerable situations of these children who were often kept hidden and isolated from public view. Given its pioneering and unconventional interventions, the KDF faced suspicion, controversy and even harassment. Despite all this, KDF's advocacy has been consistent, relentless and uncompromising. The ILO-IPEC programme counts the KDF as one of its earliest and more valuable partners, with its work having inspired many in the child labour community.
This publication is a welcome addition to the growing literature on exploitative and hazardous child labour not only in the Philippines but globally as well. Its publication is as timely as other ILO initiatives including the international convention on intolerable forms of work.
