How to Eliminate Child Labor: Start Small, Then Grow

Child labor varies across regions in Honduras; some children work in coffee fields while others work in tire shops or sell goods on the street. Poverty drives child labor, compounded by limited economic opportunities, cultural norms, lack of knowledge of labor rights, and inadequate education access. Initiatives like World Vision's Bright Futures project aim to address these root causes, starting with community education and empowerment to break the cycle of poverty and child labor, fostering a vision for a brighter future where children can access education and pursue sustainable livelihoods.

Discover more about World Vision's strategy, in collaboration with the U.S. Department of Labor , to combat exploitation in Honduras through insights shared by Katie Taylor , one of our communications program officers.

What child labor looks like in Honduras

In La Florida, a tiny community in the coffee-growing region in the highlands of Honduras, child labor used to be a common sight. The community, well off the beaten track, didn’t offer a lot of economic opportunity other than working in the coffee fields. To parents, it made sense for their children to start working, wielding machetes and carrying heavy loads, instead of completing their education. After all, it was what they had done when they were children.

On the other side of the country in Sambo Creek, a few miles east of La Ceiba on the Caribbean coast, there aren’t coffee fields to work in. Sambo Creek is a Garifuna village, a people of mixed African and indigenous American ancestry. There, community leaders explained that kids often work in tire shops, carwashes, or selling food and trinkets at stoplights—instead of going to school. There was little awareness about labor rights, for either children or adults, which left the entire community vulnerable to exploitation.

More than 219,000 children in Honduras are involved in child labor according to the Honduras National Institute of Statistics. However, the actual number may be much higher, given hidden labor and the lack of updated information (more on that later). A number of those children work in some of child labor’s worst forms*, including commercial sexual exploitation and drug trafficking.

The biggest culprit driving child labor is poverty. But it’s not the only one: cultural acceptance, lack of opportunity, exploitation, and poor access to education all contribute to kids heading to work instead of class. And while families in poverty may feel like they have no choice but to send their kids to work to make ends meet, by keeping kids out of school, they keep kids from accessing the education that could help them access a brighter future. Without an education, kids will be more likely to remain in poverty, one day sending their own kids to work and continuing the cycle.

Laying groundwork for a brighter future

To help break the cycle of poverty and child labor, in 2014 World Vision launched the Bright Futures project, which is funded by the U.S. Department of Labor. The project targets the underlying causes of child labor in vulnerable communities, both urban and rural. While the project is funded by the U.S. Department of Labor, project staff members are 100% Honduran, familiar with the context and national landscape.  

The strategy: Start by focusing on individual hearts and minds, and then zoom out, growing wider and wider, until the entire country was on board to eliminate child labor.  

Step 1: Start with the heart

One of the first things the project did was establish Child Labor Committees (CLCs) in each of the 98 target communities. Recruiting volunteers to form the committees, though challenging, ensures that the individuals who care the most about community change are the ones making the decisions. Once formed, committees learned they had rights, that children had rights, and that there were ways to report if those rights were being violated. In Honduras, education is compulsory until age 17, and the minimum age for hazardous work is 18; however, enforcement of these regulation doesn’t always happen in places where there is a lack of government oversight and where child labor has been a way of life for generations. Understanding children’s rights is a key first step toward community change.

Committee members also learned about:

• The short- and long-term societal cost of children missing out on their education
• How to report violations and advocate for government services
• Why having time to play is critical for children’s development

By starting with a small number of people in each community via the CLCs, Bright Futures was able to invest deeply, sharing knowledge that changed hearts and minds and giving members a new vision for their communities. “I want the kids to be tired, but from playing, not from working,” said one committee member from Sambo Creek.

In La Florida, one committee member, Santos, admitted that he himself used to send his son to work, as he didn’t see the value in education. But, influenced by the project, Santos decided to let his son Denilson finish his studies. Denilson went on to take entrepreneurship training and open his own barber shop. Now, he runs a successful barbershop in the city of Marcala. Santos shared proudly that Denilson now employs three other barbers and continues to talk to others about the harms of child labor.

The little seeds Bright Futures planted took root in people’s hearts, growing deeper in individuals and spreading from person to person.

Step 2: Zoom out to communities

With the committees now eager to put their knowledge into action, Bright Futures supported them with resources as they identified the needs they wanted to address in their specific communities.

Rural communities

In La Florida and other rural communities, committee members noted that kids who had missed out on school to work in the fields couldn’t just pop back in the classroom. They needed a place that would help them catch up to age-appropriate learning. Bright Futures partnered with coffee growers to build education centers to help bridge those gaps.

In some cases, children were old enough to start their career but still hadn’t finished school; Bright Futures worked with the CLCs to connect children and adults with vocational training and/or alternative schooling. Such was the case with Digna, from La Paz. She had left school to go to work in the corn fields and had been out of school so long she thought it was too late to go back. Bright Futures helped her become a hairdresser and work to finish her education at the same time.

Communities also cited lack of economic opportunity as a challenge—part of the lack of enthusiasm for education came from the belief that the only future for children was working in coffee fields or other agriculture, and there was no point in finishing school. In these communities, Bright Futures offered entrepreneurship training, as there is often more opportunity for entrepreneurship than traditional employment in rural areas. José, from La Florida, was only 14 when he began entrepreneurship training (after school, of course). Two years later when his training was complete, Bright Futures connected him with vocational training to fulfill his dream of becoming a baker. Now, he fills orders for cakes, breads, and donuts and teaches his younger sisters how to bake. “I am super proud of my work and what I’ve learned,” José said.

Urban communities

In urban areas, there are different barriers to education. In the community of Miramar in La Ceiba, for example, the government doesn’t provide services. Kids don’t have an option for school nearby and need to travel to a neighboring community, making them more vulnerable to exploitation in surrounding tire and mechanic shops, car washes, restaurants, and other places where child labor can hide in the shadows. But these children, ignored by so many, were a priority for Miramar’s Child Labor Committee, so the committee set up an education center. Kids of all ages are now excited to attend. When the CLC leader asks about their rights, the kids smile and yell, “To learn! To play! To not work!” The center provides supplemental education to help kids catch up and keep up and, of course, kids also learn about their rights, which makes them less susceptible to exploitation.

To increase the impact of the CLCs, Bright Futures connected them to the government agencies that are responsible for child welfare in Honduras, the Directorate of Childhood, Adolescence, and Family (DINAF) and the Secretary of Labor and Social Security in Honduras (SETRASS). The partnership helps both the government and the committees protect children more effectively. CLCs are now legally recognized, further increasing their sustainability and authority.

“Before, women had to stay quiet,” said one Child Labor Committee member from Sambo Creek. “Now, we know our rights and speak about them.”

Step 3: Zoom out to the nation

As the efforts of Bright Futures took root in the community and became more self-sustaining, the project expanded further in 2020, this time going nationwide. Bright Futures is now collaborating with the national government, workers unions, and employers to end child labor. Together, they are acting with national impact. Those actions include:

• Launching a Seal of Compliance (Seal of Self-Compliance with Labor Regulations for the Prevention and Eradication of Child Labor): To bring awareness to child labor issues in supply chains, where it can be more easily hidden, Bright Futures partnered with the National Commission for the Gradual and Progressive Eradication of Child Labor in Honduras (CONETI) to create a Seal of Compliance for companies that certify as child labor-free. This seal will reward companies who have worked to eliminate child labor from their supply chains, offering a competitive advantage as consumers will have insight into which products are child-labor free. This will also increase pressure on companies who have not taken steps to qualify for the seal to do so as soon as possible. 
• Creating a new Electronic Case Management System: One of the challenges the Honduran government is facing is an inadequate system to address reports of labor violations, which means that reports of child labor, exploitation, and other abuses take too long to get addressed, or worse, go unaddressed entirely. Bright Futures is in the final stages of creating, in partnership with the government and national employers, a system to properly digitize, standardize, and organize reports of labor violations and inspections. This system will drastically increase accountability and efficiency, ultimately creating an environment where it is harder to hide and easier to stamp out child labor. The Secretary of Labor and Social Security (SENAF), employers, and employees will be able to file reports, request inspections, and see the status of their requests all within one user-friendly tool.
• Undertaking a National Child Labor Survey: Just as knowledge opened the eyes of the CLC members and compelled them to act, Bright Futures is working to bring eye-opening information to the entire country. Early in 2023, the project launched a national child labor survey in partnership with the National Institute of Statistics and the Honduran Secretary of Labor and Social Security. This will be the country’s first comprehensive national survey focused on child labor and will bring light to the state of child labor and inform government policies. The results are expected to be shared publicly in 2024.  

By investing in these national-level tools, Bright Futures is widening out to inspire and support national-level action.

Step 4: Finish strong

By starting small and expanding wider and wider, Bright Futures has been able to welcome partners at all levels to work together to eradicate child labor. Government partners now have greater support from the community and more effective tools. The formal work of the Bright Futures project is scheduled to end in September of 2024, but its impact will continue, spreading from heart to heart in communities like La Florida and Sambo Creek, and spreading through the halls of government as new tools and information equip them to act effectively long after the project ends.

World Vision is grateful for the support of the Bureau of International Labor Affairs (ILAB) through the U.S. Department of Labor, which works to reduce exploitation, including child labor, globally so that the world can benefit from a safe, fair global economy.

“Whoever welcomes a little child like this in my name welcomes me.” ~Matthew 18:5

Funding is provided by the United States Department of Labor under cooperative agreement number IL-26259-14-75-K. 100% of the total costs of the project is financed with USG federal funds, for a total of $13 million dollars.

Written by Katie Taylor, Communications Programs Officer, World Vision U.S.

* The International Labor Affairs Bureau (ILAB), which is part of the U.S. Department of Labor, uses four categories to definite the worst forms of child labor: (1) Any form of slavery or practices similar to slavery, such as the sale and trafficking of children, debt bondage, and serfdom. (2) Child prostitution and pornography. (3) Illicit activities (such as the production and trafficking of drugs). (4) Work that is harmful to health or safety.