Child Labour in Bangladesh: Trends, Patterns and Policy Options

This study examines the trends, patterns and policy options of child labour in Bangladesh particularly during the 1990s. The striking finding in the trend and incidence of child labour in Bangladesh is that while child labour is on a declining trend in other South Asian countries – India and Pakistan and in the world, it has been increasing in Bangladesh. This increasing trend in the incidence of child labour particularly focuses on the irrelevance or inadequacy of existing child labour laws in Bangladesh. This study suggests that a combination of policies would be appropriate for reducing child labour. These include employment generation schemes that lead to economic prosperity for the household, compulsory schooling for children, school enrolment subsidy, improving school infrastructure, the quality of education, flexibility in school schedules and adult literacy campaigns that increase community or social awareness, especially of the adult female.

Impact of Child Labour on School Attendance and School Attainment: Evidence from Bangladesh

The paper examines the linkages between child work and both school attendance and school attainment of children aged 5–17 years using data from a survey based in rural Bangladesh. This paper first looks at school attendance as an indicator of a child’s time input in schooling; then it measures the “schooling-for-age” as a learning achievement or schooling outcome. The results from the logistic regressions show that school attendance and grade attainment are lower for children who are working. The gender-disaggregated estimates show that probability of grade attainment is lower for girls than that of boys. Household permanent income, parental education and supply side correlates of schooling (presence of a primary (grade 1-6) school and secondary (grade 6-10) school in the village) are appeared to be significant determinants of schooling in rural Bangladesh. The results of this study further show that the effect of household permanent income, parental education and presence of secondary school is higher for grade attainment than school attendance.Schooling, Child Labour, Logit, Bangladesh

Child labour: the effects of globalisation

This paper analyses the current trend of global child labour, and investigates the causes and consequences of child labour with a particular attention on globalisation-child labour nexus. Though a decreasing trend is observed, the incidence of child labour is still alarming. The incidence in hazardous work is increased by 2.5 percent for the children aged 15-17 years over 4 years. Though controversy exists, poverty is still revealed as a strong determinant of child labour. Among the other factors, parents’ education, credit market constraints, schooling performance, child’s nutrition and health status, family size and birth order, higher schooling costs, lack of quality education, employer’s attitude, inappropriate government policy play major roles. It is also evident that child labour negatively affects child’s physical and mental health, educational outcomes, adult employment, adult earnings and bargaining power of adult workers. The theoretical arguments regarding the effects of globalisation on child labour is ambiguous. Empirical evidences also provide us mixed results

Child Work and Schooling in Bangladesh: The Role of Birth Order

Using data from Bangladesh, this paper examines how the birth order of a child influences parental decisions to place children in one of the four activities – ‘study only’, ‘study and work’, ‘neither work nor study’ and ‘work only’. The results from the multinomial logit model show that being a first-born child increases the probability of working as the prime activity or at least combining school with work rather than schooling only. The results confirm that later-born children are more likely to be in school than their earlier-born counterparts.Birth order, Child labour, School Attendance

Does the financial performance matter in accessing to finance for Libya's SMEs?

This study investigates the impact of financial performance of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) on access to finance in Libya. The study is based on the primary data of 557 survey questionnaires on SMEs in various sectors of different regions of Libya. The data analysis contains the computation of descriptive statistics, correlation statistics and multivariate regression analysis. Our results confirm that financial performance expressed by liability to assets ratios, profit, return of assets have no significant effects on access to finance in Libya

Childhood obesity and the income gradient: evidence from Australia

This paper examines the dynamic nature of human capital formation in the context of childhood obesity and the association of household income and childhood obesity in Australia using the first five waves of the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children (LSAC). Our results show a strong evidence of dynamic nature of child obesity: the lag obesity is a significant and robust predictor of obesity in the current period. We also found that the main channel for childhood obesity is inter-generational trait: the probability of obesity in children born to an obese mother or father is 15% higher than that of other children. Other important determinants are lifestyle factors, including the consumption of drinks with a high sugar content and the amount of time watching TV. Income becomes an insignificant determinant of childhood obesity once we control for unobserved individual heterogeneity

Does maternity leave affect child health? Evidence from parental leave in Australia survey

One of the arguments that is advanced in support of paid maternity leave (PML) policies is that the mother’s time away from work, around childbirth, is expected to improve maternal health and child health and development. However evidence on these links is scarce and, until recently, little was known about the link, if any, between child health and maternity leave. Moreover, the limited literature that does exist tends to use aggregate data (i.e., an “ecological design”) to test the hypotheses that maternity leave affects maternal and child health. Evidence from micro-level data is rare because of the unavailability of such data on household level. We employ such data from the Parental Leave in Australia Survey (PLAS), which is a nested survey of the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children (LSAC), to examine the impacts of maternity leave on child health. Using the PLAS and the first two waves of the LSAC we find that maternity leave, as measured by the duration of paid maternity leave (PML) and other forms of leave around childbirth, have strong and statistically significant effects on: child health, the decision to breastfeed, the duration of breastfeeding, and the probability that child immunisations are up-to-date. Our results show that mothers who take maternity leave are more likely to breastfeed their children and also that longer-term maternity leave is associated with an increase in the duration of breastfeeding. Our results also confirm that both mothers’ PML and fathers’ paid paternity leave (PPL) have statistically significant and positive effects on general health status of children. We also find that, in most specifications, the effects of PML are significant if the duration of leave is at least 6 weeks. PML is also significantly associated with a lower probability of some childhood chronic conditions such as asthma and bronchiolitis, but the effects of PPL on these conditions is ambiguous

The impacts of international migrants’ remittances on household consumption volatility in developing countries

This study measures the impacts of remittances on reducing volatility of household consumption using a panel dataset of 84 developing countries during the period from 1978 to 2012. This study shows that the volatility of household consumption can significantly be reduced by international migrants’ remittances. The robustness checks reinforce the stabilising impact of migrants’ remittances on consumption volatility in developing countries. Since the overall consumption is an integral part of household welfare, the findings of this study highlight that international migrants’ remittances may indeed contribute significantly to households’ welfare through reducing the volatility of consumption in remittance receiving developing countries

Child labour and school attendance: evidence from Bangladesh

Purpose – The objective of this paper is to understand better the determinants of child labour and schooling in Bangladesh. Design/methodology/approach – This paper uses data from a survey based in rural Bangladesh and considers the children aged 5-17 years living in rural households in which the mother and father are both present. The sample size is 1,628 children. A multinomial logit model is used to estimate the determinants of schooling and working, combining schooling and work, or doing nothing for 5-17 years old children. Findings – The results show that the education of parents significantly increases the probability that a school-age child will specialise in study. The presence of very young children (aged 0-4) in the household increases the likelihood that a school-age child will combine study with work. The significant and positive gender coefficient suggests that girls are more likely than boys to combine schooling with work. The children who are sons and daughters of the household-head, as opposed to being relatives living in the household are more likely to combine study and work but less likely to specialise in work. Originality/value – The existing anti-child labour policies mainly focus on the lowering of the demand for child labour in Bangladesh. The focus of this paper is, however, on the supply side of child labour, particularly on the use of child labour in the agricultural sector and the household sector where children are mainly employed by their parents. Unlike most of the existing studies on child labour, this paper considers housework and non-market works in the definition of child labou

Child labour and school attendance: evidence from Bangladesh

Purpose – The objective of this paper is to understand better the determinants of child labour and schooling in Bangladesh. Design/methodology/approach – This paper uses data from a survey based in rural Bangladesh and considers the children aged 5-17 years living in rural households in which the mother and father are both present. The sample size is 1,628 children. A multinomial logit model is used to estimate the determinants of schooling and working, combining schooling and work, or doing nothing for 5-17 years old children. Findings – The results show that the education of parents significantly increases the probability that a school-age child will specialise in study. The presence of very young children (aged 0-4) in the household increases the likelihood that a school-age child will combine study with work. The significant and positive gender coefficient suggests that girls are more likely than boys to combine schooling with work. The children who are sons and daughters of the household-head, as opposed to being relatives living in the household are more likely to combine study and work but less likely to specialise in work. Originality/value – The existing anti-child labour policies mainly focus on the lowering of the demand for child labour in Bangladesh. The focus of this paper is, however, on the supply side of child labour, particularly on the use of child labour in the agricultural sector and the household sector where children are mainly employed by their parents. Unlike most of the existing studies on child labour, this paper considers housework and non-market works in the definition of child labou