A report by the Work No Child’s Business (WNCB) project has indicated that the number of children in child labour in two Karamoja districts of Moroto and Nakapiripirit as well as Busia has gone down.
The five-year project that started in 2019 aimed to ensure that all children and youth to be free from child labor and enjoy their rights to quality education and (future) decent work and was implemented in partnership with Hivos, Uganda National Teachers Union (UNATU), Save the Children, Nascent Research and Development Organization (NRDO), and Environmental Women in Action and Development (EWAD).
The project results released on Friday in Kampala indicated that in the three districts, there has been a 5% reduction in child labour.
“There has been a 5% decrease in the proportion of children aged 5 to 17 engaged in child labour within their households from 56% in 2019 to 51% in 204,” the report says.
The report also indicates there has been a 7.3% increase in the percentage of children aged 5 to 17 attending school from 71.6% to 78.9% in 2024.
The number of boys has gone up from 73.6% in 2019 to 80.9% while in terms of girls, the number has gone up from 70.2% to 77.3%.
On the other side, while 84% of children aged 5 to 17 are currently attending school in Busia district, 76% in the same group are attending school in Nakapiripirit and Moroto districts.
The report however says 53.1% of children aged 5 to 17 years in Karamoja and 47% in Busia are still engaged in some form of child labour within their households characterized by excessive time taken to do domestic work.
The report from the project also says that 87% of former working children are currently attending school, 7% in secondary, and 6% in vocational tertiary education with 89% of former working boy children and 84% former working girl children currently attending school.
Decent employment
The report also indicates that there has been a 15% improvement in the proportion of young adults aged 18 to 24 in decent employment, rising from 30% in 2019 to 45% with more females at 48% than males at 41%.
Of these 57% of young adults in Busia are decent employment while 39% of those in Karamoja are enjoying decent employment.
Juliet Wajega, the National coordinator of the Work No Childs Business in Uganda explained that the project specifically targeted the three districts of Moroto, Nakapiripirit and Busia because they have high rates of child labour.
“Actually in Karamoja, over 55% of the children are in child labour. The high causes of child labour in these districts include children having nothing to eat and therefore have to go to mines to get something to eat. In mining areas , there are no schools and the nearest government schools are over 10km away. So the parents opt to take children to mines to look for something to eat,” Wajega said.
She noted that some cultural beliefs have greatly contributed to high levels of child labour.
“In areas like Karamoja, parents believe that a child must work to put food on the table. That’s why they allow children to go to areas like mines and other forms of child labour.”
The executive director of Environmental Women in Action for Development (EWAD) explained that using a community based approach, they have built the capacity of most key stakeholders like community leaders, parents , teachers and the business community to sustain efforts to end child labor even in the heavily secretive gold mines of Busia.
The deputy Dutch Ambassador to Uganda Joost van Ettro hailed the Ugandan government for its support and the readiness to work with this coalition to tackle child labor.
He said the Netherlands government is committed to continued support to efforts aimed at addressing child labour and its root causes by providing lasting solutions.
The state minister for Gender Labour and Social Development in charges of Employment and Industrial Relations Anyakun said the problem of child labour is still big and need concerted efforts.
“As we speak right now, we have over 15 million children in the country and 40% under child labour which is alarming. We need to deal with this problem,” Anyakun said.
“As government, we remain committed to ensuring that all children have access to free quality education, while also preventing child labor.”
