Malawi tobacco report 2009
Jump to full article: Plan International (uk), 2009-08-23
Intro: Multinational tobacco companies have slowly and surely been shifting their
production from the fields of the United States to developing countries in a bid to
cut costs. This shift has seen a massive drop in U.S tobacco production – to a point
where 75% of production is now found in developing countries.
While this change should mean more employment and greater benefits for the
local economy, this is not always the case. Despite the profits of the multinational
companies, local tobacco farmers continually struggle to break even. This leads
them to look for ways to cut costs and means more children are being exposed to
exploitative and hazardous working conditions.
While the tobacco companies obviously profit from these reduced labour costs,
children in Malawi receive just 17 U.S cents (11 pence) for 12 hours of unrelenting
work.
As one of the world’s largest tobacco producers, Malawi is reliant on the tobacco
industry for its national income and thousands of children, some as young as five,
work in the fields to support their families. Through original participatory research,
Plan has gained an insight into the realities of their lives.
As well as long hours and little pay, children revealed that they suffer physical and
sexual abuse from their supervisors, regularly have their pay withheld and are
unknowingly blighted by the effects of Green Tobacco Sickness. (GTS)
The emotional and physical impact that these conditions have on their wellbeing is
immense. As well as the long-term psychosocial effects of abuse, the hazardous
working conditions could seriously impair their development.
GTS is a poisoning found in workers who cultivate and harvest tobacco and is
exacerbated by rain or dew on the crop.* On humid days the average field worker
may be exposed to as much as 54 mg of dissolved nicotine – the equivalent to
more than 32 average cigarettes.
“Numerous animal studies have shown that administration of nicotine
during childhood and adolescence produces long-lasting changes in
brain structure and function, as well as behavioral changes, that are not
seen when nicotine is administered to adults. Thus the brain of a child or
adolescent is particularly vulnerable to long lasting adverse neurobehavioral
effects of nicotine exposure.” . . .
Executive summary
Malawi has the highest incidence of child labour in southern Africa. 88.9% of the
children in the age group 5-14 work in the agricultural sector, where tobacco estates
are highly represented. The number of children working on tobacco farms in Malawi
has been estimated at 78,000 although the actual number is thought to be much
higher.
Previous research gives some information on the different activities children are
engaged in on tobacco farms, some information about the hazards children face and
some understanding of why children are involved in this work. But very little work has
been done with children themselves to find out how they experience and understand
the work they do or to find out what children see as the best form of intervention.
For this reason Plan Malawi decided to undertake this participatory study. The
research will be used to inform the work Plan and its partners in Malawi are doing to
raise awareness of child labour on tobacco farms, to advocate for changed
conditions and to develop interventions for the affected children.
The research approach was a participatory one in which 44 children (aged 12-18)
from three districts across Malawi (Lilongwe, Kasungu and Mzimba) took part in a
series of workshops. All of the children had worked full-time on tobacco farms during
the 2007/2008 season. 16 were working full-time on tobacco farms at the time of the
research and 18 part-time. The children worked on a range of different farms from
large estates to small family farms. All worked outside their own families. Parents
and para-civic educators were also consulted.
The workshops, which were carefully constructed to take into account ethical issues,
included drawing, mapping, storytelling and discussion. All of the discussion was
recorded and transcribed and this formed the data which was analysed using
thematic analysis. The findings are presented under the set of themes that emerged
from the analysis.
Hard work, long hours and little pay
The children did the full range of tasks on the farms; there was no differentiation
between work done by children and adults. Most of the children worked for 12 hours
a day though some worked for much longer. Apart from the break for lunch (usually
the only meal of the day) there were few breaks. The unrelenting nature of the work
was one of the issues raised by the children. Children reported that the work was
often too hard for their size and that they often had pay deducted if they did not finish
the work given for that day.
The average daily wage earned by the children in the study was MK26 (USD0.18),
reportedly less than that of adults. The children reported often being paid according
to the work they did and some had worked with parents to help parents finish their
quota of work.
One of the issues that concerned children was that they were often paid less than the
amount they were promised at the beginning of the season. Most reported that the
money they earned was not enough to meet the needs at home that had motivated
them to seek work in the first place.
Why we are working
The main reason children gave for working was poverty at home. Lack of food,
clothes and the need to mend their houses as well as the need for fertiliser and seed
iii
for their family farms were common needs at home. School fees (for secondary
school) and school needs were also common reasons given for working.
It was clear that it was the children themselves who chose to work because of the
situation at home. In fact many of them expressed a strong sense of responsibility
toward their families, particularly those living with aging grandparents, or ill or
disabled parents.
One significant finding is that though the criteria for selecting the children did not
include vulnerability (para-civic educators were told to find ‘children who were
working on tobacco farms’) it emerged that a large majority of the children came from
elderly-headed households or orphan households. 22 of the children in the sample
were double orphans and 12 were single orphans. This suggests that children from
vulnerable families are more likely to be involved in child labour.
Abuse from supervisors
Children reported physical abuse in the form of beating (with a stick and hand) and
kicking from supervisors. Supervisors also withheld food and used verbal abuse,
often related to their orphan status.
Sexual abuse was also widely reported. Supervisors used their power to force girls to
have sex in exchange for more money, food and late arrival at work. Girls reported
that if they lived at the farm they slept apart from their parents and owners or
supervisors came to rape them at night. This issue was raised by boys who felt angry
at their powerlessness to do anything, and by girls who were clearly afraid, often
thinking about what was in store for them on the way to work. Girls also reported that
very few girls talked about this issue.
Impact of work on children
Apart from aching muscles caused by work that was too hard for them and the
beatings they experienced the children reported a number of troubling physical
symptoms. Health problems that are related to lack of access to soap and water and
time to bath were commonly reported.
Symptoms of Green Tobacco Sickness were widely reported . . .
Recommendations
A set of recommendations around advocacy, public education and direct intervention
for working children is included in the report. These include the need to use the
information in the report to inform advocacy around poverty alleviation, particularly in
relation to vulnerable households. The report provides powerful stories that can be
used to lobby for stronger punishment for those who break labour laws and employ
children and to lobby for more effective implementation of the labour laws that do
exist.
The report also provides evidence for use in advocacy programmes around access
to schooling generally and the need for programmes to help working children who
wish to return to school. The need for research into school models that cater for
working children is another recommendation raised in the report.
A set of recommendations is made in relation to the health status of working children.
These include access to health services, particularly testing for TB and HIV.
A number of recommendations are also made around public education. These
include the need to educate the general public about vulnerable children and the
need to care for them rather than to discriminate against them. Education around
child rights for children and for adults should also be a priority. Para-civic educators
are a potential resource for education campaigns at local level. This public education
needs specifically to include programmes for children who are not working about
children who are working.
Mechanisms that allow children to report abuses at work and programmes that offer
psychosocial support for working children should be a priority.
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