West Africa
Poverty forces hundreds of thousands of children in the region into exploitative labor because they need to work just to get enough money to survive. These children are rarely able to go to school because they are working instead.
Children are bought and sold into many working situations, a practice across West Africa known as child trafficking. Parents are often tricked into sending (or selling) their children into child labor because the people buying their children promise they will be looked after, receive an education and be paid well for their work. This is not the case. The majority of these children are mistreated, paid very little (if anything at all) and denied their right to go to school.
Children are bought and sold into many working situations, a practice across West Africa known as child trafficking.
Think About It, Talk About It
Your students may have a hard time understanding child trafficking. Ask them to imagine they are living in West Africa. Have them close their eyes while you paint the picture:
They are the only living parent of four children. The other parent has died of AIDS. They only make about $1 a day selling tomatoes in the marketplace. They don’t have enough money to feed their four children or send them to school.
One day, a man in a nice suit and shiny shoes comes into the village. He drives up in a clean and fancy car. He says he works on the coast as the owner of a fleet of fishing boats. He says he needs children to work for him because children have the small hands needed to tie the knots in the nets. He says they will make hundreds of dollars, that they will have all the fish they need to eat and that they will get to go to school.
Ask your students to think it through. If their children stay in the village, they will never be able to go to school and they will never have enough food to eat. They will never be able to afford medicine if they get sick, and there’s a good chance they won’t live very long.
What decision would your students make? Would they keep their children in the village, or would they send them with the man?
After they’ve made their decision, remind them that what the man said to the parent was not true: children are exploited, mistreated, not paid for their work and not allowed to go to school. Many parents will never see their child again.
In addition to child labor and child trafficking, West African children face other barriers to getting the education they deserve. In rural areas, the quality of education is often low and schools lack the resources they need to conduct proper classes. Parents find it difficult to afford the uniforms and supplies necessary to send their children to school, plus schools are often too far away for children to attend. In addition, parents often need their children’s help with income-generating activities in order to feed their families.
Life of Girls
Girls in West Africa have a harder time going to school than boys for a number of reasons:
- They are often needed at home to help cook and care for younger siblings.
- They are often expected to marry at a young age.
- If parents pass away from illnesses like AIDS, girls are the next in line to run the household.
- These and many other factors hinder children in West Africa from getting the education they need to break out of poverty and to lead productive lives.