Efforts to end child labor in Syria

National program officer for UNICEF in Damascus, Ms. Siham Dillo, said Syria does not suffer from the problem of child labor as in other countries. But Syria is persistently seeking to ensure a better future for her children.

She added that in 1995, the Women's General Federation in cooperation with UNICEF conducted a primary study on child labor designed to learn reasons for child labor. This year, the Syrian Ministry of Social Affairs and UNICEF are jointly conducting a comprehensive field study on child labor.

A supervision committee was formed embracing all concerned ministers and people's organizations in addition to a technical committee whose task is preparing sample surveys and questionnaires The study is expected to be finalized in the first quarter of 1998.

The Syrian national committee for children's rights is assigned to follow up the implementation of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Dillo concluded that any comprehensive attack on child labor must also mobilize a wide range of protagonists: the government, society, NGO's and spiritual leaders, employers and trade unions, the child laborers themselves and their families.