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=Modern Child Slavery= Modern child slavery is when a child, or a child’s labor, is sold or purchased. The child slaves are forced, coerced, or controlled through violence to do grueling work with limited or no pay. The work or circumstance is likely to harm the health, safety or morals of the children. It interferes with their schooling by depriving them with the opportunity to attend, forcing them to leave early, or causing them to attend school along with their excessively heavy work load.

The children’s work places are generally dangerous, and the work hours are excessively long. The children are often subject to sexual, physical, and verbal abuse. They are unable to escape because they live in poverty, and most of them have little to no education, so improving their position is near impossible. According to the International Labor Organization (ILO), in 2002, 8.4 million children are in slavery, trafficking, debt bondage, and other forms of forced labor.

Forced Labor
Forced labor is any work or service that the child has not given voluntarily. For example, violence or coercion is used to get a child to do a job. There is also no option of escape for children in forced labor. If there is abuse, whether is it physical, sexual, or emotional, causes the children to believe that there is no other option, and their only choice is to work. Many enslaved children do forced labor for much of their childhood, and even into their adult life. The tasks are often more difficult than what they can physically manage.

Domestic Employee
Children domestic employees are persons, often under the age of eighteen, who are in other people’s households doing chores, running errands, caring for children, and helping their employers running their small businesses. Their employers don’t necessarily have to be strangers; instead, they are often the children’s relatives. Some domestic employees can be paid or unpaid. They can also live in their employers house, or live separately. Parents send their children to these families, thinking it will provide the children with new opportunities and education. However, they often don’t realize how high the risk of abuse and exploitation the child is in. These children often do not receive an education, since the family may only have enough money to send their own children to school.

Debt Bondage
Debt bondage, also called bonded labor, is considered the most common form of modern child slavery. This is when children are used as collateral on a loan or to pay a debt. ILO estimates there are 5.7 million children in bonded labor and forced labor. Often, Children become subject to bonded labor because their families don’t have enough money to meet daily needs. The families give their children to creditors as payment on debts, or the parents might use the child’s labor against a loan. On the other hand, children could be abducted and placed into a bonded labor situation, because children may have to borrow money from their slaveholders in order to buy food and survive. This only increases their debt. Living expenses and trafficking costs create a situation where the children owe more than they can ever earn. Some children are eventually freed when they grow older, and other times their debt is passed to their family, or inherited by their own children. These children are often unaware of how long they will working off their debt, and often never succeed on paying it off. This is because the slaveholders don’t unusually intend on letting them go, and the debt is just a form of manipulation. Even though the children can make some money in this situation, it is still considered a type of slavery, because the child does not benefit from the money in a significant way.

Restavek
Restavek is the name for a child in Haiti who is sent by their parents to work for a host household as a domestic servant because the parents lack the resources required to support the child. Many Haitians live in rural areas where most of the schools in their area only go up to the sixth or eighth grade, and so families will send their child to households in the city where education is possible. Often, the family the child will go to live with will be relatives. However, these families might not have the money or the desire to educate the restavek and there is a high possibility that the restavek will be abused. The restavek id forced to take care of the household, to do all the chores, and is often left to care for the family’s children. The United Nations consider restavek to be a form of modern child slavery. Restavek are usually thought to be girls, but there are boys involved in the system as well. The age of a restavek can be between five and seventeen years old, but at the age of fifteen many girls get kicked out of the household. It is believed that the 2010 Haiti earthquake has caused many more children to become restaveks, because children were orphaned and the relatives or other families were left to care for them.

Chattel Slavery
Chattel slavery is when the child is not treated like a person, and is instead treated like chattel or property. These slaves are captured or born into permanent servitude. They are treated as if they have no identity, and they can be traded or sold by their masters. This type of slavery is largely practiced in Mauritania and Sudan.

Religious Slavery
Slavery though religion usually consist of giving children to temple gods or priests. For example, the trokosi system in Ghana has a tradition of men asking for strength in battle and, in return, the men bring a young girl to the priests. These young girls are used for labor and as sexual slaves. In India, some communities have very poor families, and they commonly give their daughter to the temple to serve the goddess Yellama. The girl would have to do all the duties asked of her by the priest in order to have food and shelter.

Sexual Exploitation
Child sexual exploitation is sexual exploitation of anyone under eighteen by an adult; often, this includes payment to the child or to a third party. The different forms of sexual exploitation include child sex tourism, distribution of child pornography, child sex shows, and child trafficking for the sex trade. Not all the children involved in the sex trade are slaves, however. The ones that are slaves were forced into the sex trade, bought from another party or were often trafficked from other places. These children are unable to go home, and have no way of leaving the sex trade. The sex trade can be found anywhere from brothels to prostitution on the streets. These children are engaging in sexual activities in order to have key needs fulfilled, such as food and shelter. They are at high risk of dangers, such as experiencing violence or contracting sexual diseases like HIV.

What Enslaved Children Do
Child slaves work at all sorts of jobs around the world. About 60% of child labor occurs in agriculture, fishing, hunting, and forestry. The children working in agriculture often work in extreme temperatures to pick cotton or harvest crops. Child slaves are also involved in manufacturing goods, such as carpets, clothing, glass, and many other things. Enslaved chilren are also involved with quarrying and mining things such as coal, charcoal and chrome. Children as young as six or seven will break up rocks, wash, sieve, and carry ore. Children who are as young as nine will work underground setting explosives and carrying loads.

Domestic Servitude
Domestic servitude is forced labor inside of homes. These children are at risk of enslavement and abuse because outside people aren't able to monitor their working conditions. The domestic service employs 90 percent more girl then boys. In many cases, children are sent to relatives in order to receive training for a skill, and in return, the children are expected to provide service around the house. However, children are often required to perform chores that are beyond their limit and their health and educational needs are not met.

Child Carpet Weavers
Two thirds of the world’s carpets come from the carpet weaving industries in India, Pakistan and Nepal, where close to one million children work. This industry had a major problem with child labor, because of the horrible work conditions in which children can work up to 20 hours per day. However, there aren’t just children who are working for money in these factories. There are also child slaves. The child slaves are the ones who have been bought, and who cannot go home to their families at the end of the day. They have been trafficked from many different places, and not paid for their labor. It is often hard to tell the difference between the child slaves, and the other children because of the same working conditions. They are forced to work in very small spaces, which can cause them to suffer from spinal deformities. They are also exposed to “harmful chemicals dyes, and are vulnerable to eye damage, lung disease, stunted growth and arthritis”. Their employers prefer children to work in their factories because they are easier to control through intimidation than adults.

High Risk Children
The children who are at the highest risk are girls, orphaned children, and children living in extreme poverty. Also, children who have a language boundary, a disability, or no education are at high risk. Many of these children suffer from discrimination, especially girls, who are expected to do the housework because of there gender, and also must do some kind of economic work outside the household. Therefore, their burden is greater. Girls also experience the risk of pregnancy, and will often be abandoned on the streets if they become pregnant.

West Africa
After a lapse of twenty five years, the slave trade in West Africa is thriving again. The slavers are following the old slave trade routes, but with modern vehicles. The sale and trade of person is illegal, but poverty has led families into desperation, and this is increasing the number of children being trafficked to places that will exploit them for labor and sex (stop demand). In the South-West, more girls are trafficked into prostitution. In the east, however, the problem affects mainly boys "who find themselves trafficking into agricultural, domestic, trading and apprenticeship jobs”.

In order to control the children, slavers will use whips and drugs to subdue them. The trade exists in most states in sub-Saharan West Africa. The children are kidnapped or purchased for “20 to 70 dollars each by slavers in poorer states, such as Benin and Togo, and sold into slavery in sex dens or as unpaid domestic servants for 350.00 dollars each in wealthier oil-rich states, such as Nigeria and Gabon”.

South Asia
Child trafficking is illegal in South Asia, but it has also become a big business, especially in the Philippines. Children are lured from their homes in the archipelago, because they are promised high-paying jobs in Manila, the nation’s capital. However, instead of the high-paying jobs they were thinking of, the girls end up in the sex industry and the boys work on farms and fish markets as slaves.

Tens of thousands of children are trafficked within their own borders, and many of them are used in the growing sex-tourism industry (child trafficking prevalent). Thailand also seems to be a “regional hub in which children are diverted to other cities and countries, including Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Japan”. The main mode of child trafficking in Asia is by ship, and the Philippine coast guard is constantly looking for possible trafficking ships. Child trafficking is one of the most lucrative businesses, next to drugs and arms smuggling.

Haiti
Haiti is a nation founded on anti-slavery, because two-hundred years ago the Haitian people revolted from the French, making it one of the most successful slave rebellions in history. However, despite Haiti’s history there is an alarming amount of child slave labor in the country. Currently, there are over 300,000 children enslaved as part of the Restavek system.

Six months after the devastating earthquake that destroyed the Haitian capital, child slavery escalated dramatically. The earthquake left behind many orphans, who are vulnerable to slavery. Restavek is the name given to children who have been given by their “biological parents to a family for the purpose of doing minor housework in exchange for school, food and housing”. This is considered slavery because the children are forced to leave their homes and community, and their only payment is often food and shelter. These children become a domestic slave, and are often forced to do all the chores around the house and to take care of the smaller children. Girls are more vulnerable to sexual abuse, and there is a risk of her getting pregnant after she reaches puberty.

The earthquake killed more than 300,000 people. This means that almost an entire generation of children are left homeless, or to become a restavek. Many times, families will offer their neighbors children to become domestic slaves. In the Haitian culture, this is seen as a better alternative then to live on the streets. However, this is not necessarily true.

Society
Enslaved children are usually denied the access to education. The lack of education in children affects the society as a whole. In extreme poverty, however, work is prioritized over education. Even though children do learn a skill that will help them make money, the jobs that they might be able to get with an education would also help them make money, perhaps more. Also, there are long term benefits of living in a society where children are educated. Longer life expectancy, and decreased fertility rates that slow population growth are linked with children who have education.

Economy
The total annual profit generated by slavery is about thirteen billion. Goods are usually cheaper in areas that use slavery, because the labor to make or move the goods is free. Consumers are usually not told that the product they are buying was made at the expense of enslaved children. Child labor allows cheap prices for the consumer, and high profit for the seller, but at the expense of children’s lives.

Health
Little attention is paid to the health of child slaves, because the slavers know there are many other potential slaves, and they can just get rid of the sick or injured. After the children are discarded, they are left on the streets where they become beggars. The children are left without a job, or any basic needs like shelter, food, water and sanitation. Children working in agriculture frequently inhale pesticides, which cause repertory problems. Child miners are at risk for repertory disease as well, or death due to mining accidents. In glass bangle factories, children inhale kerosene fumes and can suffer from burns. Female children are at a higher risk of being sexually abused, and from contracting a sexually transmitted disease, such as HIV. Enslaved children also suffer mentally. The slavers use coercion and manipulation to control the children, and this is just as harmful as physical violence. The children also suffer from the effects long-term trauma long into their adulthood.

International Labor Organization
The International Labor Organization has become one of the biggest organizations trying to eliminate Child Slavery. In 1992, ILO (International Labor Organization) created the International Program on the Elimination of Child Labor (IPEC), which exists in ninety-two countries in the world. In 2008, IPEC “collaborated with over sixty million in technical cooperation to eliminate child labor”. The United States and European countries are the main donor to IPEC, but other donors also include: Dominican Republic, Japan, New Zealand, South Korea, Brazil, Australia, and Canada. Most of the countries donating are developed ones. However, Brazil and Dominican Republic have made donations, but slavery still takes place in their countries.

UNICEF
UNICEF’s strategy for abolishing child slavery is to focus on building a protective environment, strengthening government ability to enforce the law, working with the media, and making children visible again. They are trying to change the attitudes of the communities, who do not see child slavery as a problem, or do not hold the same definition of what a child is. UNICEF is working on changing prejudice against the children, which can lean to abuse, especially sexual abuse of young girls.

Legality
Law is an important instrument in abolishing child slavery, because it helps protects the children’s rights. However, laws are often ignored, and are difficult to enforce. The first treaty was the Declaration Relative to the Universal Abolition of the Slave Trade, which made it illegal to sell slaves during the 18th and 19th century around the world. After that, The Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948 made it illegal for a human being to be held in slavery or in slavery conditions. However, despite slavery being illegal in most places around the world, child slavery is still the norm in many countries. The International Labor Organization sponsored the two important instruments of international law. In 1973, the Minimum Age Convention 138 “established the obligation for countries to work towards a minimum age of 15 for legal employment”. The 1999 Convention 182 for the Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labor asked governments to identify the child labor in their country, and present national plans for its elimination. However, as of February 2011, ten countries have not ratified Convention 182. These countries are the once that have the worst forms of child labor, such as India, Burma and Sierra Leone. Also, many countries that have ratified the Convention are not following their objectives in a timely manner, and nothing is changing for the enslaved children. So far, laws are not effective in decreasing child slavery, especially when the state is economically dependent on the free labor the children provide. For example, new laws are constantly being introduced in South Asia, but they are just being ignored by the business owners, and the laws accomplish nothing.

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