THE problem of child labour is happening not only in our country but also in many countries around the world, said the deputy minister of the Ministry of Social Welfare, Relief and Resettlement.

Due to the economic and social effects of the outbreak of COVID-19, children are far away from education. It is found that children have become workers, he added.

The deputy minister said at the Committee on the Elim ination and Rehabilitation of Forced Child Labour in the Worst Forms" meeting of Myanmar's National Action Plan for the Elimination of Child Labour held at the ministry's assembly hall yesterday afternoon.

The first five-year plan (2019-2023) of the national plan to eliminate child labour in Myanmar, which is currently being implemented, will soon end, and it is necessary to speed up the work, he said.

Next, the deputy minister continued that the Department of Social Welfare is carrying out school-based child protection activities and community-based child protection activities.

The deputy minister said at the meeting that they are coordinating with organizations to establish a social incident management system to handle the children affairs.

After that, the members of the committee discussed the activities and the deputy minister gave the closing speech. A country with child labour has a high unemployment rate and high proportion of lowskilled workforce.

It will only end up with low wage jobs and so on.

All these facts can have an impact on the people's organization such as delaying the country's economic growth and development.

According to the ILO's survey, there are 151,622 child labourers worldwide, and 72,525 children are in hazardous work.

Htun Htun/GNLM

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