Daet, Camarines Norte—The Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) Region V together with the International Labour Organization (ILO) officials, BAN Toxics and its partners; Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE), the local government units (LGUs) and its barangays will celebrate the World Day Against Child Labor (WDACL) in Villa Mila Hotel on May 30, 2018.

The WDACL theme is: Ligtas sa Paggawa, Malusog na Batang Malaya (Generation Safe and Healthy).

WDACL campaign focuses on the need to end child labor and to improve the safety and health of young workers as part of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). This is an annual event to spread awareness about the negative impacts of child labor and how to address it by underscoring existing strategies and initiatives.

Currently, DSWD, ILO, Bantoxics is implementing the Strategic Helpdesks for Information, Education, Livelihood and other Developmental Interventions (SHIELD) project for Child Laborers in three municipalities with the highest cases of child labor, namely, Labo, Jose Panganiban and Paracale which started in June last year.

For this year, SHIELD implementers will covey a WDACL summit that will engage 200 child laborers and stakeholders including their families, miners and financiers from the six pilot villages implementing SHIELD, namely, Malaya and Dalas in Labo, Sta. Rosa Sur and Luklukan Sur in Jose Panganiban and Palanas and Tawig in Paracale.

Activities include Literary and Arts workshops, Family Development Session (FDS) and forum on the following topics: Occupational Safety and Health in Small Scale Mining, Child Labor Situationer, Formulation of Commitment.

A press conference will be conducted at 11:00am to12:00 noon tomorrow.

On the other hand, a storybook will be produced from the literary and art workshops that will be presented tomorrow as part of the culminating activity. The storybook will be distributed to the mining areas as part of the project’s advocacy material.

The key guests and speakers are Child Labor Officer CARING-GOLD Mining Project Arlene Taguba, BAN Toxics Program Manager Sarah Marie Aviado, DSWD Social Technology Bureau Chief Marilyn Moral, DOLE Assistant Regional Director Rovelinda Dela Rosa, Jose Panganiban Mayor Ricarte Padilla, Labo Mayor Joseph Ascutia, Paracale Mayor Lourdes Briguerra and Gov. Jonah Pimentel.

SHIELD utilizes a three-pronged approach and multi-layered strategies to help eliminate child labor, particularly its worst forms and those in the blanket ban (below 15 years old). These approaches and strategies are reflected in the three (3) project components: Child Labor Local Registry (CLLR), Barangay Help Desk on Child Labor and Organizing, Advocacy and Capability Building.

This year, the DSWD through the SHIELD project has provided educational assistance for the first quarter with a total of PhP117,000.00. Each child is entitled to PhP500.00 per child every month.

The LGUs already formed SHIELD Multi-Disciplinary Team (MDT), developed and pre-tested CLLR tools, designated SHIELD help desk persons in all six pilot barangays, profiled child laborers and their families and passed their Barangay Resolution in the adoption SHIELD. To date, there were 264 validated of the 274 recorded child laborers, 78 of which received educational assistance from DSWD while the 102 children were withdrawn from the mining activities.

SHIELD is being implemented not only in Bicol but also in Region IV-A and Region VIII as pilot areas in the whole country.

Based on the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) 2011 data, Bicol has the highest number of child laborer in the country with 218,400 or 10.4% if the 2.1 million child laborers.