1. Child labour in the context of the Syrian refugee crisis
Taking stock and moving towards
a common strategy
Peter Matz, Inter-agency consultant
Amman,
A few words about myself: I am a former ILO and UNICEF staff member and consultant, and I am carrying out this current assignment on behalf of UNHCR. At the same time, UNICE F and ILO are also members of the steering committee for my consultancy, which should ensure that we consider child labour among refugees from different perspectives.

2. Overview
International and national legal frameworks regarding child labour
Stocktaking of child labour in the 3RP countries:
Data
Current initiatives
Challenges in the response
Draft regional strategy
1-2) Some of you will be familiar with this, but not all of you have a background on child labour.
3) Results of a stocktaking exercise

3. Concepts and legal frameworks
I. Introduction
Concepts and legal frameworks

4. The international legal framework
ILO Convention No. 138 (1973) on the Minimum Age of Admission to Employment
ILO Convention No. 182 (1999) on the Worst Forms of Child Labour
UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989)

5. What kind of work should be eliminated?
So, what does this mean? What’s the gist of it?
Not all forms of children’s work must be eliminated, as it is not all harmful for children. You can see here that child labour can be regarded as a subgroup of children in employment. The WFCL are yet another subgroup of child labour, which should be eliminated as a matter of urgency, and which is the focus of our deliberations.

6. Types of work to be eliminated (by age group)
Another way to look at the same issue.
Source: ILO

7. Child labour in the SDGs
Goal 8: Decent work and economic growth
Target 8.7: Take immediate and effective measures to eradicate forced labour, end modern slavery and human trafficking and secure the prohibition and elimination of the worst forms of child labour, including recruitment and use of child soldiers, and by 2025 end child labour in all its forms.
The national legal frameworks in the region are quite developed, and all five countries have ratified all three of the mentioned conventions.

8. National legal frameworks
Country
Minimum age
Light work
Hazardous work
List of hazardous work
Jordan 16 -- 18
2012 rev.
Lebanon 14 13
18 (16)
2013
Iraq 15
2004
Turkey
Egypt 12
2003
The national legal frameworks in the region are quite developed, and all five countries have ratified all three of the mentioned conventions.

9. Hazardous work parameters
Activity and tools
Work environment
Duration
Timing (work at night)
Age
Distance to work
Relationship with employer
These are the main parameters that should be considered in order to ascertain whether work carried out by children is hazardous.
Note that some of these can be modified, which may change a potentially hazardous form of child labour into an acceptable form of work (based on the child’s age).

10. 5-14 15-17 18+ Adolescent children
Adolescent children who are above the minimum age but below 18 are in a special position, with regards to the legal framework on child labour.
Allowed to work
The must be protected from hazardous work. In many cases, this could mean changing their work conditions (OSH)
They have a right to education, which may mean secondary education or skills training (formal or non-formal)

11. Conceptual framework Child labour is both:
Key child protection issue > strengthen child protection systems, community-based mechanisms etc.
Multi-sectoral problem > establish a coordinated, multi-sectoral response
Changes in social policy are very likely to have an effect on CL in one direction or the other, even if they are CL-blind. For example, the suspension of WFP food vouchers in Jordan in 2015 lead to an increase in CL (and the resumption of vouchers led to a decrease).
That said, mainstreaming child labour in social policy reform (such as those envisioned by the London Conference) can enhance the impact on CL.
In addition, targeted interventions on the worst forms will also be necessary.

12. Global action pillars
Four threads of action (III Global Child Labour Conference, Brasilia, 2013):
Social protection for children and families
Quality education
Specific legislation and inspection against child labour
Labour and employment policies

13. Prioritising among different forms of CL in emergency settings according to impact and scale
This graph illustrates the last bullet point.
Source: Inter-agency toolkit on child labour in emergencies (draft)

14. Main principles for child labour case management
Medium/low risk
Medium/high risk
High risk
At risk of WFCL
Ages 15 to 17 in hazardous
Under 15 in hazardous
Unconditional worst forms of child labour
Prevent WFCL +
Case management
Reintegrate in school and/or address financial situation
Separate from hazard (or reduce risk to acceptable level)
Work may continue
Remove
Reintegrate in school and/or address financial situation
For case managers, this is how this prioritisation would play out in practice.

15. II. Child labour in the 3RP countries
Results from a stocktaking exercise (June/July 2016)
Before I start with the second (and final) part of the presentation, now would be a good time to make comments or ask questions.

16. Objective of the stocktaking exercise
Consolidate knowledge
Inform the future strategic response to child labour among refugees from Syria in the 3RP countries (and within Syria)

17. Methodology Desk review :
recent child labour assessments at regional and national level
other relevant documents, such as guidelines, studies, and workshop reports
Interviews with staff of UNHCR, UNICEF, ILO, and other NLG partners
What are existing approaches and initiatives on child labour in your country?
What are lessons learned, emerging good practices, and/or useful tools on child labour among Syrian refugees?
What are key gaps and needs for support on child labour among refugees?
So far, I have visited Lebanon, Kr-I, and Jordan.

18. Data on refugee child labour
Substantial evidence that the Syria crisis is pushing an increasing number of children towards exploitation in the labour market
Za’atari Camp, Jordan: 13.1% of surveyed children were child labourers (2014)
Akkar, Lebanon: 86% of the children worked, often under dangerous and strenuous conditions (2015)
Iraq (KR-I): “a dramatic increase in the numbers of IDP and refugee street working children”. CSEC “on the rise.” (2016)
Lack of reliable large-scale assessments
UNICEF/Save the Children. Three out of four reported health problems at work – nearly 80% suffer from extreme fatigue and almost 40% reported injury, illness or poor health.
ILO/UNICEF/Save the Children.
Terre des Hommes
There have been recent child labour surveys in Lebanon and Jordan, but the preliminary results regarding refugees are not credible.

19. Children’s occupations
Jordan: Cleaning, shops, restaurants, garbage collection, construction sites, mechanics, carpenters
Lebanon: Agriculture (orange picking, tobacco), street-based activities, workshops, restaurants, hairdressing, construction, garbage collection
Iraq: Street-based work, restaurants, hotels, agriculture, industries, plastic recycling, steel factories
Turkey: Garment factories, dried fruit factories, shoemaking workshops, auto mechanics, street-based work, agriculture
Children have been found working in various sectors, occupations, and activities. TdH 2016.

20. Hazardous child labour
Hazardous child labour is widespread:
Lebanon: 85% of working children employed in hazardous work (ILO, 2012)
Dangerous work environments, without protective gear, overworked and exposed to the sun
Serious health risks in agriculture: pesticides and fertilizers
Turkey: 40% of working children in hazardous conditions, e.g. in garbage collection, construction, and factories (TdH, 2016)
90% of the working children work 6-7 days a week and for more than 8 hours per day on an informal and illegal basis
Small-scale assessments

21. Causes of child labour Economic reasons High poverty level
of refugees themselves,
of the host communities
Exhaustion of savings
Depletion of income
Exhaustion of other coping mechanisms
Families need support
High rental prices
High (youth) unemployment in the host countries and Syria
Lack of access to education
High transportation costs
Social tensions with host communities
Health situation
Illness of a family member
Family situation, e.g.
Parent died in the war
Younger siblings
Lack of humanitarian assistance
High demand for cheap labour in the textile industry (Turkey)
Source: Terre des Hommes (2016)
Lebanon: food insecurity, costly residency renewal procedure
Jordan: Lack of work permits for adults
Turkey: high demand for cheap labour in the textile industry
Iraq: family values, saving money for onward journey to Europe

22. Regional opportunities and challenges in the response
Linking national child labour mechanisms with the humanitarian response
Enhanced inter-agency collaboration on child labour
Increasing opportunities for adult refugees to engage in formal work
Regional challenges:
Limited expertise on child labour among child protection actors, and therefore a lack of clarity on how to respond to the problem
Lack of documented impact of interventions
Limited inter-sectoral dialogue and lack of inter-sectoral approach on child labour
Let us now turn to the regional opportunities and challenges in the response, first in overall terms. After that, I will take you through opportunities and challenges by sector for child protection, education, and livelihoods/cash assistance.

23. Child protection: Context
Quality of national child protection systems varies considerably across the various countries
The degree to which refugees have access to these systems also varies
The following CP strategies have been adopted by the NLG initiative:
Access to quality community-based child protection, including PSS interventions, will be scaled up
Specialised child protection services will be offered
National formal child protection systems will continue to be strengthened
> Child labour is mainstreamed throughout, but most work on child labour has been carried out under strategy no. 2

24. Child protection: Opportunities
Within the Syria crisis, CP has received significant levels of funding and expertise.
Increasing commitment among CP actors to address the worst forms of child labour.
The legal/policy framework for child labour in the region is quite strong .
CP systems in some countries are quite effective (Jordan, Turkey) or are being strengthened (Lebanon).
SOPs for child protection case management have been developed in Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, and Iraq.
Within the Syria crisis, child protection has received significant levels of funding and expertise when compared to other refugee appeals.
SOP for child protection case management have been developed in Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, and Iraq, which are an essential building block to ensure timely, effective and accountable delivery of specialized child protection services, including for working children

25. Child protection: Challenges
Uneven level of quality and capacity of child protection systems in the region.
National child protection services have been overwhelmed by the scale of the crisis.
CPWGs insufficiently linked to national child protection coordination structures (and national actors are not sufficiently engaged in CPWGs).
Still challenges for refugees to access national services, including child protection ones.
Child labour modules in case management SOPs are not sophisticated enough, and prioritization procedures regarding child labour within case management procedures are often not clear.

26. Education: Context
Child labour and education for refugee children are inextricably linked.
CL is one of the key barriers to education for Syrian refugees in the region.
The lack of access to education and/or poor quality of education can act as a significant push factor into CL.
More than 1.6 million refugee children of school age in the 3RP countries – over 916,000 of them may be out of school (52%)
Situation of adolescents and youth is of particular concern: lack of access to secondary and tertiary education, vocational training, or NFE opportunities
London 2016 Conference Syria Crisis Education Strategic Paper: “education interventions need to be more systematically linked to child protection systems and livelihood opportunities for youth”
Source: 3RP mid-year report 2016.

27. Education: Opportunities
Increased attention from national governments and donors towards:
Quality of education
Secondary education
Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET)
Focus on accredited NFE can help children in child labour to (1) transition back to school and/or (2) learn basic skills needed to continue mitigate the risks
ILO’s SCREAM methodology has been successfully implemented in non-formal education settings in Lebanon.
UNICEF’s ”Back to learning” campaign provides a good opportunity for mainstreaming child labour.
Other specific ongoing efforts on education for refugees in the region may provide opportunities for mainstreaming child labour:
Education grants for refugee children (Egypt and Lebanon)
Teacher professional development and support
Promoting life skills and citizenship education

28. Education: Challenges
Funding for education has increased in recent months, but in 2015, almost half of the Sector’s funding was received late in the school year.
Refugee children face additional challenges, related to access to education, particularly at the secondary level, as well as bullying, curriculum, language of instruction, and certification.
Adolescents are especially vulnerable to the worst forms of child labour.
A better understanding of the reasons why children and youth are out of school is needed, including demand-side barriers.
This has hampered planning and programming, and this scenario might repeat itself in 2016.
These issues may aggravate the push momentum into child labour.

29. Cash/livehoods: Context
Globally, livelihoods activities are the most common and successful part of programming aimed at responding to the worst forms of child labour
Some positive examples of cash assistance contributing to a reduction of child labour
Lebanon: Multi-purpose cash assistance contributed to a (limited) reduction in child labour
Jordan: Economic stability afforded as a result of UN cash assistance and WFP vouchers enabled vulnerable families to prevent their children from engaging in paid labour
However, the evidence across the region on this is limited and mixed
In the 3RP, cash-based interventions are grouped under the Basic Needs Sector, while livelihoods come under the Livelihoods and Social Cohesion Sector.
UNICEF: “A window of hope: UNICEF Child Cash Grant Programme in Jordan – post-distribution monitoring report, 2015.”

30. Cash/livelihoods: Opportunities
New study on child labour and cash assistance planned in Lebanon (LCC)
Investment in cash assistance for refugees has increased in UNHCR.
Social protection and cash assistance for refugees have also gained prominence over recent years across several other UN agencies (including UNICEF, ILO, WFP etc.).
Ongoing discussions on how to improve the targeting and effectiveness of cash programming.
A promising pilot initiative on education-focussed cash assistance in Lebanon integrates child labour concerns .
Cash-based interventions for refugees in Egypt provide specific entry points for mainstreaming child labour concerns, by linking with a longitudinal analysis of vulnerability and PSS.
The Government of Turkey has been entrepreneurial in bringing a mature social protection system to Syrian refugees. This might serve as an example for other countries.

31. Cash/livelihoods: Challenges
Loss of family income and livelihoods is the most significant risk factor contributing to children becoming involved in the WFCL.
Key global challenges for programmes linking livelihood interventions with child labour:
Defining and managing roles and responsibilities,
Dissemination of information,
Principle of “do no harm”.
Lack of interventions dealing with household reliance on child labour in the region.
Adolescents above the legal minimum age but under the age of 18 are currently excluded from most livelihood programmes.
Vulnerability criteria differ between countries, and the degree and accuracy with which child labour is considered within the targeting is unclear.
Many cash experts (e.g. LCC) are struggling to measure the impact of cash on child labour outcomes.
This is likely to continue to be the case given the protracted nature of the crisis.
Source: CPWG, child labour in emergencies review

32. Labour force participation and decent work
Access to labour markets for adult refugees
Decent work
Female labour force participation rate
Linkages with youth employment
Occupational safety and health (OSH)
Fourth sector that is highly relevant to the issue of child labour is the labour and employment sector (which of course overlaps with the livelihoods sector). Here the ILO is the lead agency. Some of the key issues are…
I just have one slide on this issue, which is indicative of the fact that I have so far not a lot of details on programming in the 3RP countries have been brought to my attention. This is a gap which I am looking to fill in my upcoming missions.
In the stocktaking report, I have included separate sessions on the context, opportunities and challenges in each of the five countries. I haven’t included this in the current session (for the sake of timing), but you are welcome to read it later.

33. Main recommendations
Ensure a multi-sectoral response, which aligns the humanitarian response closely with the national response.
Focus on the worst forms of child labour, especially hazardous child labour.
Finally, a few recommendations that have emerged from the stocktaking exercise.
Given the multi-sectoral nature of child labour, a multi-sectoral response is required, in order to effectively eliminate the worst forms of child labour in the 3RP countries. Key actors from child protection, education, livelihoods, and basic needs (cash-based assistance) should agree on a common regional strategy on child labour for the Syrian response, as well as cross-sectoral plans at the country level to operationalise this strategy. In this regard, the humanitarian response should be closely aligned with the national response, in order not to create parallel systems.
As the sheer scale of the problem and the level of the current response make it unrealistic to eliminate all forms of child labour simultaneously, interventions on child labour in the 3RP countries should focus on the worst forms of child labour, especially hazardous child labour. A phased approach should be adopted, which prioritizes the worst forms of child labour.

34. III. Draft regional strategy on child labour
Main components

35. Regional strategy on child labour: Expected outcomes
Educational policies and programmes are designed and implemented to effectively address child labour.
Policies and programmes address socio-economic vulnerability of refugees with a view to mitigate the risks of child labour.
Child labour is effectively included in broader child protection programmes.
Specific child labour interventions are implemented, to provide targeted and holistic support to the most vulnerable children and their families in the worst forms of child labour.
Enhanced knowledge management and coordination on child labour, to ensure an efficient and sustainable response.
This includes reducing barriers of refugee children to access formal education with focus on secondary school aged children, as well as providing flexible, appropriate educational options for working children.
This includes advocacy with governments on policies related to refugee families' access to livelihoods and ensuring that these policies benefit those households more likely to have child labour, such as female headed households.
Case management, child-friendly spaces, programmes to address unaccompanied and separated children, programmes to address justice for children, and other child protection interventions effectively address child labour concerns.
Families and children are engaged on how to prevent and respond to child labour through community based protection interventions.
It also includes more effectively tracking the impact of livelihoods and cash-based assistance programmes on child labour and revising the design and implementation modalities accordingly.