Child Labour Dynamics and Implications for Sustainable Development in Nigeria

Abstract

The prevalent of child laborers in Nigerian urban centers has remained a very intractable problem. Over the years, this phenomenon has changed both in form and characterization covering a wide range of work activities, such as domestic service, bus conducting, industrial work, street hawking, and child trafficking, with enormous adverse consequences both for the children and the nation, at large. The implication of this dynamism for sustainable development has not adequately been explored and analyzed by the scholars. Locating the dynamism of child labor in Nigeria within the theoretical context of poverty hypothesis, the paper argues that the engagement of children as laborers to supplement the family income is not only an aberration in a richly endowed nation, like Nigeria, but amounts to compromising the future development of these children and the nation. With this precarious situation, the paper argues that Nigeria will undoubtedly continue to be a backbencher in her quest for sustainable development among the comity of nations because of her present lack of investment in the future of these children trapped in child labor activities.

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