Honduras: More than 350,000 Children Forced to Work
Honduras: More than 350,000 Children Forced to Work
Tegucigalpa, Jun 14 (Prensa Latina) More than 400,000 Honduran children and teenagers have to work in order to subsist, said today official sources.
According to a survey issued by the National Institute of Statistics (INE), child workers increased by 40,000 ones in the last five years, thus the total amount increased to 379,598 children subjected to child labor in Honduras.
The total amount represents 15.3 percent of the Honduran population aged between five and 17 years old, although the biggest concern is that the highest amount of those children, aged from five to 13 years old, work under the age limit to have a job.
The Human Rights Commissioner said that many times children are forced to work for exhausting periods of time, up to 16 hours a day, hence 61 percent of them are not able to attend school.
According to INE, three out of four child workers are male, and they usually work in agriculture, forestry, fishing, trade, hotels, restaurants, cleaning services in the community and manufacture industry.
Meanwhile, girls usually work in household chores in their houses or other people's houses, being exposed to physical and emotional abuse, while they are given wages lower than those established by the law.
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