Dominating Factors on Educational Deprivation of Child Labor in Bangladesh

Author: Muhammad Shariful Islam, Associate Professor

Department of Social Work
University of Rajshahi
Rajshahi-6205, Bangladesh
Phone: +88-01711482431
E-mail: msiswru@yahoo.com

Abstract

The core objective of this study is to investigate the influences of some selected socio-economic and demographic factors on education of child labor in Bangladesh. To do so the data has been collected from Gaibandha district using purposive sampling technique through a structured questionnaire. Data has been analyzed using various statistical tools (percentage distribution, test, and logistic regression analysis). The study results reveal that 63.80% of child laborers have completed their primary education and only 11.80% have completed class VI or more. Again, a few (11.70%) of them have continued their education smoothly and most of them (88.30%) have not continued their education. Consequently, most of the child laborers are deprived of education. About 81.50% of child laborers have left school due to poverty. Age, salary, working hours per day and working place have positively significant effects on educational progression when parental education has negative and father's education has a stronger effect than mother's. Finally, evidence from the study indicates that poverty and unconsciousness or lack of education of parents lead to increase the prevalence and intensity of child labor and decrease the likelihood of maintaining their normal educational progression.

Key Words: Child Labor, Educational Deprivation, Gaibandha District, Chi-square, Logistic regression.

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Introduction

Work that is performed for payment and outside of the family by someone who is under age, and allowed by the country in which the child resides, is known as child labor (Budhwani et al., 2004). Education is the backbone of a nation. Moreover children are the future of a nation. The International Labor Organization (ILO, 2006) estimated in 2004, the global number of child laborers aged 5-17 years was 218 million. There were 117.2 million boys and 100.5 million girls. In that time child labor was mostly concentrated in the Asia- Pacific region and Sub-Saharan Africa with 122.3 and 49.3 million respectively with 5.7 million in Latin America and the Caribbean. The rest of the child laborers were in other regions of the world. Glick and Sahn (2000) have found high returns in the labor markets for investments in education for both men and women. In another study, Glick and Sahn (1997) have identified that the earning of women and men increase with schooling in both self-employment and wage employment. Similarly, in studies by others, Psacharopoulos (1994) has consistently shown that child education has higher returns than other physical assets. Despite these apparent benefits and high potential returns to education, the level of education and educational attainment remain remarkably low in most developing countries like Bangladesh, and child labor participation, considered to be a competing activity to schooling, continues to be a common phenomenon. Rahman (1999) found that Bangladesh is considered to be one of the child-labor abundant countries and the number of child laborers is 6.58 million out of the 34.45 million children in the age group of 5-14 years. Also this report has shown child labor constitutes about 12% of the total labor force of Bangladesh. Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS, 2003) revealed that the total number of child laborers aged 5-17 years is 7.90 million with 73.50% boys and 26.50% girls. This report also revealed that the child laborer aged 5-17 years in rural and urban areas are 81.01% and 18.99% respectively. Khanam and Ross (2008) have shown that school attendance and grade attainment are lower for children who are working. The results of this study further have shown that the effect of household permanent income, parental education and presence of secondary school education is higher for grade attainment than school attendance. Maitra (2003) has estimated results that there is no gender differential in current enrolment status but grade attainment is higher for girls, relative to boys. Also an increase in the permanent income of the household is always associated with an increase in educational attainment and parental education has a positive and statistically significant effect on the educational attainment of children, and mother's education has a stronger effect on both school enrolment and grade attainment of children compared with father's education. Khanam (2008) have shown that the education of parents significantly increases the probability that a school-age child will specialize in study and the presence of very young children (aged 0-4) in the household increases the likelihood that a school-age child will combine study with work. This report has further shown that the children who are sons and daughters of the household-head, as opposed to being relatives living in the household, are more likely to combine study and work but less likely to specialize in work. Though many researchers have been studied and Government and non-Government steps have been increasing, there is a halt in the declining trend of child laborers and increasing trend of educational progression. This raised a crucial situation for our country development, as a response to this situation, some researchers made attempts to understand the reasons behind this stagnation of child laborers and have come up with various explanations. Thereafter, the policy makers are still trying to make polices to reduce the number of child laborers and increase the educational progression of child laborers. So, there is better scope to study the facts, causing child laborers and low educational progression for them. The findings of the study may help to understand the effect of risk factors of high number of child laborers and low educational progression, and identifying strategies to take educational development programs for child laborers.

Data and Methods

The data on 1157 child laborers, through purposive sampling technique by a structured questionnaire, was collected from the Gaibandha district which is one of the disadvantaged localities of Bangladesh in terms of poverty, low rate of education, increasing child labor, deprivation of basic health facilities and disaster. We think that it will be a representative sample in terms of various characteristics of the whole of Bangladesh. Educational progression was calculated by using the formula which considered as a dichotomous dependent variable Y. It took the value 1 if the child laborers were below normal progress (<100) and 0 otherwise. The explanatory variables were age, salary, working hour per day, family size, working place, occupation of household head, father alive, educational attainment of parents. Age is measured by the number of completed years at last birthday. Chi-square statistic and logistic regression techniques were applied for finding the appropriate pattern of child laborers.

Results and Discussion

Study population was 1157 child workers of whom 81.80% were males and 18.20% were females, in Table 1. The study proclaims greatest percetages (90.90%) were Muslim and 9.10% non-Muslims child laborers. The vulnerable age structure of child labor with 30.50%, 54.70% and 14.80% aged 5-11 years, 12-14 years and 15-17 years respectively. Among the respondents 80% were enrolled in school. But, when asked about current attendance at schools, only 19.20% reported that they were still going to school and 80.80% have already dropped out of school. Among the respondents who have left school, 81.50% reported 'poverty' as the main cause behind leaving school. In this collected sample, 63.80% have obtained education at primary level, while only 11.80% have completed class VI or more.

Though the working children have very little time to go to school, 79.80% expressed their willingness to go to school. It is observed that most of child laborers enforced by poverty (64%) and one quarter (25.10%) of the respondents mentioned 'family pressure' as the main cause for becoming a child laborer. Working children are the objects of extreme exploitation in terms of toiling for long hours for minimal pay and 36% of the respondent's work 10-14 hours per day, which is obviously hard work and inhumane. It is a matter of more regret that 8% of the respondents work 15 or more hours per day. Though they have to work for a long time without any rest, they get a very poor payment. Some of them work only for food. More than one quarter (27.70%) of the respondents get no salary for their work while 40.20% reported their salary within 1000 Taka per month. As the earning of child labor is very little, they can hardly save any money. More than four fifths (83.10%) of child laborers reported that they couldn't save any money. Drug addiction is a serious social problem in Bangladesh, especially in the study area. If a child becomes drug addicted, he can't continue his normal life and must be out of work. The study found a considerable number (35%) of respondents' addicted to cigarettes and so on. The study depicts that 97.40% of the respondents get the opportunity to play regularly. About three quarters (73.90%) of the respondents reported that television was the main media of their entertainment. It was found that there is a very low awareness level among the respondents and one quarter (23.80%) of the respondents do not know that the Government provides free primary education in our country. 43.90% do not know about the allowance provided by Government for girls at high schools. 80% of the respondents have no idea about the prohibition of child labor. While working with child laborers, it is very important to have sufficient information on household characteristics of child laborers. Table 1 reveals that 89.50% of the child laborers reported their father as household head. The combined family system is decreasing and 91.0% of the respondents are from the single parent family as well as 66.30% of child laborers come from large family sizes as 5.7. The occupation of household head is an important element to affect a family. Day labor seems to be dominant (45%) among the various occupational categories of household head. 43.3% of the child laborers reported the income of household head between 2001 to 3000 Taka per month and 42.70% reported between 1001 to 2000 Taka per month while 7.90% reported that their household head earnt not more than 1000 Taka per month. In the same Table it outlinessome parental characteristics where 89.50% and 96.6% of the all respondents were found with their fathers alive and mothers alive respectively. We get some important figures about educational attainment of parents, which is a remarkable determinant of child labor. 70.40% of the respondents reported that their fathers are illiterate while 83.40% of the respondents reported that their mothers are illiterate.

Bivariate analysis using chi-square statistic shows that 88.30% of the working children are falling behind, which indicates only 11.70% of child labors are able to maintain the normal educational progress according to age. It seems that a huge quantity of child laborers are deprived of obtaining education. Among all child laborers 29.70% and 1.80% aged 5-11 years, and 15-17 years respectively, are able to maintain their normal educational progression. Table 2 reflects that the value of unadjusted chi-square statistic with 2 degree of freedom is 30.673 which indicates that the age of child laborers is highly associated with educational progression at zero percent level of significance. The study in the same Table shows that with the increase in the salary range, the percentage of child labor falling behind goes up and the values of unadjusted chi-square statistic with 4 degrees of freedom is observed to be 34.693 which means there is a high association between income and educational progress of child labor at zero percent level of significance. The child laborers who work more hours per day have very little time for study; the consequence is less schooling in terms of educational progression. The value of unadjusted chi-square statistic with 3 degrees of freedom is 128.874, which is asymptotically significant at zero percent level. About 85.50% of the child workers who have been working for less than or equal to one year, are falling behind. Interestingly enough, all (100%) of the child laborers who have been working for more than seven years (8+) are falling behind and the value of unadjusted chi-square statistic with 3 degrees of freedom is observed to be 13.626 for educational progression, which is asymptomatically significant. There is a higher association between family size and educational progression. The percentage of child laborers falling behind in each category (of family size), go up with the increase in family size except for the last category (10+). With 3 degrees of freedom, the value of unadjusted chi-square test is 25.544, which is asymptomatically significant at zero percent level. The association between educational progression and working place the child belongs to is highly significant at zero percent level of significance tested by the value of unadjusted chi-square statistic with 1 degree of freedom, is observed to be 9.221. Also father alive and education attainment of father and mother are highly associated with educational progression of child laborers.

Results obtained using logistic regression depicts that the age has a positively significant impact on educational progression and child laborers aged 12-14 years are 11.53 times more likely and aged 15-17 years are 26.88 times more likely to fall behind the normal education progress than those aged 5-11years. The salary has a significant effect on educational progression and the likelihood of falling behind is upward with the increase of salary range. Educational progression is significantly influenced by working time duration and child laborers worked 5-9 hours, 10-14 hours and above 15 hours per day are 8.085 times, 10.086 times and 14.782 times respectively more likely to be falling behind the normal educational progression than those who worked less than 5 hours. This is due to the fact that, a child spending more time at work, has very little time for study and fails to maintain normal educational progression. So, they are deprived of attaining education. Another significant determinant of educational progression of child labor is the ownership of the working places where they work. Child laborers in such workplaces that don't belong to their families are 3.113 times more likely to be falling behind than those who work in family owned working places. Children with their fathers alive are 60% less likely to be falling behind than those with their fathers dead. But children with their mothers alive are about 43% less likely to be falling behind than those with their mothers dead. Education of parents exerts tremendous effect on educational deprivation of child laborers. The child laborers whose fathers have obtained secondary or more education are about 63% less likely to fall behind than those of fathers who have obtained no education. We found greater impact of mother's education than father's education on educational progression of child laborers as Table 3 shows the child laborers whose mothers have obtained secondary or more education are about 70% less likely to fall behind than those of mothers who are illiterate.

view table 1,2 and 3

Conclusion

Children are the future leaders of a country and education is the backbone of a nation. In Bangladesh, education and work are often viewed as mutually exclusive in the lives of children. Parents' education is a most essential factor for child development but the academic education of parents is very difficult at their present situation. Thus, the policy makers should be taking the necessary steps to improve their educational qualifications and consciousness by reducing their poverty. The existing illiterate child laborers are the next fathers of this nation, which are another copy of illiterate fathers. Therefore, to reduce child laborers in future, the dominating factors of educational deprivation should be removed. In this context Government can make wider the existing food for education program and so on. The findings of this study can play an important role in identifying the significant indicator for reducing child laborers and removing the dominating factors for the educational development of child laborers. Moreover this study may be used as an information source for further study.

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