Expansion of BARMM's anti-child labor campaign set

COTABATO CITY — The initial implementation since the middle of 2023 of a foreign assisted anti-child labor campaign in southern Moro communities went on smoothly, an inter-agency bloc involved in the initiative announced on Wednesday.

Such consensus was reached by ranking employees of different entities in the Bangsamoro government, among them from the Ministry of Labor and Employment, representatives of the International Labour Organization (ILO) of the United Nations and the non-government Integrated Resource Development for Tri-People (IRDT), during a day-long dialogue here last Monday.

The activity partly delved on discussions about good and negative experiences in past months of BARMM government employees, teachers and personnel of other entities addressing child labor and use of children as combatants through a regionwide program being assisted by the government of Japan.

Bai Sara Jane Sinsuat, director of the Bureau of Employment, Promotion and Welfare of the MoLE-Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao and Elias Salazar, project officer of ILO for BARMM, separately told reporters on Wednesday that their dialogue last Monday enabled most participants to recommend measures meant to hasten more the implementation of the program based on their experiences in recent months.

“All was well actually but our purpose was to maximize our anti-child labor campaign in the Bangsamoro region, which is being assisted by the ILO and the government of Japan,” Sinsuat said.

The multi-sector, inter-agency anti-child labor campaign is now being implemented extensively in this city and in a number of towns in Maguindanao del Sur and Lanao del Sur, where employment of children as laborers is prevalent due to poverty and underdevelopment.

Government personnel and representatives of anti-child labor advocacy blocs involved in Monday’s event charted plans on addressing gaps and hitches they have had in enforcing the program in the autonomous region in recent months.

Among their recommendations on how to boost their initiative is to tap the support of more religious leaders and local executives in the autonomous region.

"Invoking religious teachings in furthering this campaign will help a lot," Sinsuat said.

BARMM agencies and non-government organizations involved in the campaign had earlier capacitated selected teachers, school principals and officials of the different schools divisions in Lanao del Sur, Maguindanao del Sur and in this city to support the program. 

Salazar said the expansion of more comprehensive anti-child labor campaign in BARMM is now underway.