According to the latest report of the International Labor Organization (ILO), 246 million children between the ages of 5-17 engage in child labor. The majority of the world's 211 million working children between the ages of 5-14 are found in Asia (127.3 million or 60%), Africa (48 million or 23%), Latin America and the Caribbean (17.4 million or 8%), and the Middle East and North Africa (13.4 million or 6%). The rest can be found in both transitional and developed economies. Asia has the highest number of child workers, but Sub-Saharan Africa has the highest proportion of working children relative to population. The international community, which includes intergovernmental organizations such as the ILO, other UN agencies, the World Bank, national governments, and civil society organizations across the globe, have rallied worldwide to combat the most abusive and exploitative forms of child labor. The University of Iowa Center for Human Rights (UICHR) joined this global effort in September 2001 when, with the kind help of Senator Tom Harkin (an honorary member of the UICHR's Executive Council), it received financial support from the US Department of Labor Bureau of International Labor Affairs (ILAB) to implement the UICHR's Child Labor Research Initiative (CLRI), $1.2 million. Subsequent ILAB-DOL funding in September 2002 allowed the CLRI to expand both the content and scope of its beginning conception. The CLRI encompassed four major projects: 1) the development of child labor educational curriculum for both children and adults designed to increase public awareness of the problems and its causes; 2) a child labor legislative database to collect child labor legal provisions from around the world and enable researchers and scholars to better identify the methods and scope of legal protection offered to child laborers; 3) a child labor essay collection designed to summarize and refine current cutting-edge legal thought on the subject; and 4) a teacher training forum designed to assist teachers in understanding the scope of the issue and how to address it in educational curricula at all levels. The projects were undertaken and completed between September 2001 and September 2004. Complete details of the specific projects undertaken as part of the initiative, and the resulting materials generated, can be found in our Projects section. While currently unfunded, the Child Labor Research Initiative remains an active part of the UICHR's programming priorities. The UICHR regularly includes child labor-related programming in its agenda, and continues to pursue opportunities to develop and advance child labor-specific research. The Child Labor Research Initiative is one of many activities and programs of the UI Center for Human Rights dedicated to the alleviation of human suffering through the promotion and protection of human rights. The UICHR engages in other research projects, public education, and lectures and conferences relevant to human rights. Please visit our web site at http://www.uichr.org for details.
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