Theresia Sufa, Bogor – Participants in the Asia Pacific International Labor Organization seminar, which finished in Jakarta on Friday, visited Ciomas, Bogor, on Tuesday to investigate the use of child labor in the footwear industry.
Locally known as Bengkel Alas Kaki, the Ciomas district is home to hundreds of shoe and sandal workshops. Many local children work in the industry, some part-time after school and others, school drop-outs, full time.
The 27 seminar participants, from Japan, Thailand, Mongolia, Singapore, the Philippines, Laos, Cambodia and Indonesia, said they wanted to see for themselves the conditions Ciomas' child laborers worked in.
However, when the guests arrived at the workshops, only laborers aged between 16 and 18 years were working. Most of them said they had started working after graduating from junior high.
A participant from Japan, Yashusi Korube, told reporters he was glad to be able to see the living and working conditions of the laborers so he could tell people it was all right to use the goods they produced. "Child labor is not an issue in my country anymore. Maybe 20 years ago, we still had them," he said.
But when The Jakarta Post visited the workshops, a few days before the seminar participants' did, children as young as nine years old were to be found gluing shoe soles and synthetic leather.
There are some 2,000 workshops in the district, which has 11 villages. Local nonprofit group Elsppat and the International Labor Organization (ILO), as well as the Bogor Health Agency have been working with child laborers from six villages.
ILO project coordinator Mediana Dessy said there were a number of children working in the Ciomas home industry, most of whom were forced to earn additional money to support their families.
She said the ILO, Elspatt and the health agency had decided to focus first on the six villages from which the greatest number of child labors came. "Our latest data shows there are 545 children between nine and 12 years old working there," she said.
The regional seminar, held from July 12 until 14 at the Aryadutta Hotel in Jakarta, discussed the eradication of child labor. Government representatives, businesspeople and activitists from 11 countries took part.