Stop Child Labour has received funding from the Child Labour Fund from the “Rijksdienst voor Ondernemend Nederland (RVO – The Dutch State Service of Enterprises)” for participation in projects in the context of the sector covenants natural stone, gold and textiles. In these projects, Stop Child Labour cooperates with businesses, branch organisations, CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) initiatives and civil society. The different parties strive for the sustainable elimination of child labour in the production- or supply chain from businesses, without shifting child labour to different sectors or countries.
The project in the context of the textile agreement will be managed by Hivos, as coordinator of Stop Child Labour. It will be conducted in India, Bangladesh and Turkey, in cooperation with UNICEF Bangladesh and the National India Working Group. The goals for the two-year-project period include an insight in the production chain of the participating clothing companies, in order to identify risks and to implement an action plan to eliminate child labour effectively and sustainably.
The project in light of the gold agreement will be led by Faiphone. The two-year project strives to combat child labour in small-scale goldmines in Uganda. We do this by setting up child labour free zones and more human- and environmentally friendly gold extraction. Philips and Fairphone will use this justified extracted gold in their electronics.
The project in the context of the natural stone aims to improve Socially Responsible Procurement of the stone by the central government and the municipalities in the Netherlands, and to reduce child labour in the production of natural stone. In another project funded by the Child Labour Fund of the RVO, the National India Working Group cooperates with a natural stone company and an Indian NGO to realise a child labour free zone in Southern India.
