Labor dept declares 2 Cebu brgys as child labor free

TWO Cebu barangays have been included in the labor department’s list of child labor free barangays in the country.

Barangay Adlaon, an upland barangay in Cebu City and barangay Kayang in Bogo have been declared by the Dept. of Labor and Employment (DOLE) as child labor-free. Dole has drawn up an initial list of 80 barangays nationwide as child labor free.

“As we said earlier, we have a very high resolve to lick the child-labor menace in our midst, and we will work on it, one barangay at a time, until we are able to liberate all the country’s barangays with a high incidence of child labor and make them child labor-free,” said Labor Secretary Rosalinda Baldoz.

Adlaon barangay captain Elvis Narra said one of the reasons for the increasing school drop-out rates in their barangay is the parents pushing their children to work.

“When we were conducting barangay profiling several years ago, we found out that most of the children in our barangay are out-of-school-youths, and were instead busy in farming works,” said Narra.

He said the alarming result of the profiling had awakened them.

Adlaon has a population of approximately 4,000 as of this year.

About 80 to 90 percent of children were involved previously in child labor.

“Sauna, mauwaw ta mostorya,” (Before, we are embarassed to share our story),” Narra said.

After the series of programs they had with various groups, Narra said their high cases of child labor rate was reduced to five to 10 percent.

Narra proudly revealed that their barangay was awarded as child-friendly barangay from 2009-2011. /Correspondent Tweeny M. Malinao