By Ruci Mafi

What happens when extra hands are needed on the farm?

In Fiji, the answer is simple — call on the children to provide this seasonal labour — they are traditionally obliged to help wherever help is needed.  And they do, sometimes even leaving school to do so, during the cane-cutting season, for example.

The drive to develop the agriculture sector in Fiji and restore its status as the mainstay of the economy is intense, but this effort must not cost us our children’s education.

While the fact of using child labour is acceptable to some, a recent International Labour Organisation (ILO) report on the issue in Fiji argues otherwise. The Child labour in Fiji: a survey of working children in commercial sexual exploitation, on the streets, in rural agricultural communities, in informal and squatter settlements and in schools report has findings of research carried out by University of the South Pacific academic, Dr Mili Kaitani.

One such finding is that using child labour in agriculture in Fiji is increasing, and that this constitutes an abuse of their human rights. The report also noted that there is a tendency for children in rural areas and villages drop out of school at an early age to farm because they are able to earn an income and because less priority is placed on completing education.

‘These children are called fairly regularly to provide the labour required by parents and the community in which they live. When this happens, children miss out on school and lose out on growing up as normal children, missing steps in the human development process,’ said Dr Kaitani, speaking at a recent workshop for journalists and agricultural researchers from several Pacific countries, organised by the Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC) in partnership with Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Co-operation ACP-EU (CTA).

‘In helping their parents, guardians and families in rural agricultural communities, children are being deprived of fundamental human rights, particularly the right to education,’ Dr Kaitani said.

So how then do you weigh the demand for development and the need to improve livelihoods and address poverty on the one hand against human rights on the other?

The SPC’s Land Resources Acting Director, Inoke Ratukalou is adamant that there be a balance in dealing with such issues, especially in reconciling socio-economic progress against costs. ‘We will not deny that children are engaged in farms or in a general sense the agriculture sector. What must be explored is the context in which these findings are made and the situation of the families and communities studied,’ Ratukalou said.

In Fiji, there is no individual of ownership of land, or of activities related to the use and management of land. Communal ownership means cultivation and possession is the responsibility of everyone, children included.

According to Ratukalou weighing social and economic implications and benefits of the agriculture sector is important and many agriculture experts and officials have realised that there is a fine line between improved development in the sector and human rights issues.

‘What do we do, what are the choices we can make when the priority for many of these families and communities is in ensuring that there is food on the table and that basic needs are met,’ he said.  ‘These are issues we need to deal with,’ he concluded.