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Children’s World Congress on Child Labour
(10-13 May 2004, Florence, Italy)
Fighting Child Labour with Education: UNESCO’s Role
By
Qian TANG, PhD
Director, Executive Office of Education Sector
UNESCO
Mr Chairperson,
Dear colleagues,
First of all, please allow me, on behalf of UNESCO, to express my
congratulations to this Congress organized by the Global March Against
Child Labour. This important event shows the determination of people,
including children themselves, from all parts of the world to eliminate
child labour. UNESCO, as a United Nations specialized agency, is on the
same front with all of you and we fully support your actions in this field.
Child labour is a social phenomenon. It falls as economic development
proceeds, and its existence is undoubtedly a result of poverty. Our sister
agency the International Labour Office (ILO) has given us the figure of
245 million children under the age of 18 working today. The true figure
may well be above this level. To eliminate child labour for good, we
believe that we should making efforts to eliminate the root of this
phenomenon, the poverty existing in many parts of the world.
Education is a basic human right. Learning knowledge and skills
encourages people to seek democracy, ensures their self-confidence, self-
respect and personal independence, and safeguards their human rights.
Education is also vital to allow people to participate in social activities, to
find employment, to increase their income and to improve their quality of
life. Education is one of the most important and effective tools in poverty
alleviation. It is also a fundamental weapon in the fight against child
labour.
Achieving Education for All (EFA) has long been UNESCO’s top
priority in its mandate and programme activities. The World Education
Forum held in Dakar in the year 2000 set six EFA goals. These include
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ensuring that by 2015, all children of primary-school age participate in
free schooling of acceptable quality an