Child Labor in Bangladesh: A Critical Appraisal of Harkin’s Bill and the MOU-Type Schooling Program

Abstract

The article discusses child labor in Bangladesh, referring to Harkin's Bill and the Memorandum of Understanding Type schooling programs. Bangladesh is considered to be one of the child-labor abundant countries. The Child Labor Survey, 1995-96 estimates that the number of children in the labor force is 6.58 million out of the 34.45 million children in the age group of 5-14 years. Harkin's Bill concentrates on prohibition, rather than on regulation, and fails to take into account the situation of acute poverty that forces children to enter the labor force. That is why many developing countries opposed such global prohibition of child labor. These countries consider these initiatives to be a kind of disguised protectionism and claim that their children are being used to protect jobs in the developed countries. Naturally, the bill appeared as a great threat to the Bangladeshi garments industry. The U.S. and other foreign buyers declared that they would boycott this exportable item of Bangladesh as long as children below the minimum age for employment are being used by this industry.

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