Child slavery: It’s time for Canadians to shop for change

By Cheryl Hotchkiss and ChristianWeek | May 12, 2014

Have you ever lain in bed, anxiously listening to your kids making you breakfast? Did you control the urge to dash downstairs so they wouldn’t burn or electrocute themselves? Well, here’s something to ponder the next time your child proudly delivers a breakfast tray.

In Canada, we do everything possible to protect our children. (I’m a parent who is guilty of “ruining the surprise” for fear of a knife in a toaster!) However, millions of children around the world aren’t so safe and secure. They’re doing “3D” work: Dirty, Dangerous and Degrading. They’re pushed to work in mines and factories. Tricked into the sex trade. Forced to beg on the street. Trapped on fishing boats.

Unfortunately, Canadians are sometimes complicit, because these children are used to make products we buy. Take a look at your tray. The coffee, sugar, fruit and vegetables might easily come from Central America, where many children miss school to work in crop harvests. Is there chocolate in your muffin? If so, chances are it’s made with cocoa from West Africa, where children are trafficked onto plantations, spending long days swinging machetes in the heat, hauling heavy loads, and risking exposure to toxic pesticides.

According to the International Labour Organization, 98 million children work in agricultural industries around the world. Sometimes it’s safe, such as helping on the family farm for a few hours after school. Yet, too often it’s damaging their bodies, minds and spirits.

Since the factory collapse in Bangladesh last year, Canadians are thinking even more about where our products come from, and who made them. While this tragedy adds pressure to companies to prove they are operating ethically overseas, the sad reality is child labour can be easily concealed in long, complex supply chains. For example, even when children aren’t visibly working in garment factories, perhaps they picked the cotton used to make the fabric. Or maybe they toiled as slaves in sub-contractors’ secret sweatshops.

Children are not commodities; they are human beings. World Vision’s NoChildForSale.ca/faith campaign is asking Canadian consumers, Canadian companies and the Canadian government to care enough about child slavery to do something. Whenever possible, we need to choose ethically-sourced products that are certified by third parties such as Fairtrade, UTZ or Rainforest Alliance.

We also need to urge our Canadian retailers to operate ethically, especially in developing countries like Bangladesh. Let’s use our voice to ask questions about their supply chains and what they are doing to make sure their products aren’t the result of child labour.

By signing the No Child For Sale petition, you can ask leading retailers like Walmart and Canadian Tire to join the Accord on Fire and Building Safety which aims to improve labour conditions in Bangladesh, and addresses child labour.

The petition is a first step on a long journey. We’ll need faith along the way. World Vision invited Christian leaders across Canada to reflect on the connection between our faith and child labour. Catch their thoughts in a two-week daily devotional at http://churches.worldvision.ca/no-child-for-sale-church-edition/.