By Seraphine Nyuiemedi
The Trades Union Congress (TUC), has rolled out a series of sensitisation forums for farmers and fisherfolk in farming and coastal communities in the Volta Region as part of efforts to eradicate child labour and other forms of modern slavery.
At one of such forums in Sogakorfe, the Deputy General Secretary for the General Agricultural Workers Union (GAWU), of the Trades Union Congress, Andrews Addoquaye Tagoe, called for concerted efforts by all stakeholders to end the menace, particularly in the cocoa and fishing sectors.
Communities along the Volta lake in the Volta Region have been identified as hotspots for child labour and all forms of modern-day slavery.
The about 50 Participants were drawn from five fishing communities in the South Tongu District. They were taken through modern forms of slavery, such as Child labour, forced labour, bonded labour, child trafficking among others.
The forum was to sensitise the fisherfolk on dangers associated with child labour and the way forward. The Deputy General Secretary for the General Agricultural Workers Union (GAWU) of the Trades Union Congress, Andrews Addoquaye Tagoe says the Union has resolved to help in the fight against all forms of modern-day slavery including, Child labour and forced labour to safeguard and protect the future generations.
“The program that the Ghana Trades Union Congress is championing is addressing forced labour and then child labour within all value chains, within the production, within communities, within the world of work in general.”
“So that’s how come where ever Trade unions have worked very well with employers, child labour is absent. So we in the Trade Unions address some of these things at the workplace. It is not an accident that when you go to any Ghanaian formal workplace, there’s no child labour. It is as a result of long-standing activity through, collective agreement, through policy formulation and policy implementation, through addressing labour gaps that when you go to formal sector areas, you do not see child labour.”
He expressed worry about how some children are used for labour on the Volta lake saying that, such activities are detrimental to the health, education, and wellbeing of the children.
“The issue is not to take people away from the jobs that they like but the issue is to gain a certain level of education for you to decide as an adult which occupation and profession you will want to choose.”
“The issue is also to give children an opportunity to be like children. They should not be used in the middle of the lake and the middle of the sea when they are children. In the process of doing this some of them get drowned and some of them lose their lives.”
The project is funded by the Norwegian Confederation of Trade Unions (LO-Norway).
