Campaign Overview

NCL and AFOP Launch Campaign to End Child Labor (Press release)

Children in the Fields Campaign Fact Sheet                

Campaign Parameters

• Child labor only--focus on improving child labor standards in agriculture among children who function as hired workers. Also include a youth employment and training component (providing educational stipends and alternative educational support for children).
• Focus on entire agricultural industry - all fruit and vegetable harvesting.
• Not focused at all on children who work for their parents on family farms.

Campaign Focus

Government

• Improve child labor standards and conditions in this country among child migrant seasonal farmworkers.
• Strengthen enforcement of what protections there are for children working in the fields.
• Utilize the "hot goods" provision which has been successfully employed in the sweatshop issue to agricultural produce.
• Spur research through the EPA and other agencies to assess the risks children encounter in the fields from pesticides, machinery, etc. and to use the resulting data to better protect the health and safety of these children.

Consumer

• Raise awareness of children working in the fields and its negative impact on their education, health safety.
• Mobilize consumers on this issue.
• Seek a mechanism to help consumers in the marketplace who wish to buy fruits and vegetables harvested under decent conditions (i.e., no child labor; decent wages for adults, etc.).

Industry (employers and retailers)

• Raise awareness and support among leading companies, such as Kellogg, Dole, Green Giant, etc.
• Gain grower and retailer support for a mechanism to assure consumers that fruits and vegetables are harvested under decent conditions (i.e., no child labor; decent wages for adults, etc.).