CHILD LABOR IN THE PHILIPPINES

• 4 million (16.2%) of 25 million children aged 5-17 years old were economically active.
• 2.2 million were in hazardous work.
• Over 50% of the total numbers of child laborer are 5-14 years of age. Median age is just 10 years, that is 50% are aged 10 years and below.
• The highest percentage of working children came from southern tagalong (11.5%), followed by Central Visayas (9.7%) and Eastern Visayas (8.7%).
• The working children were composed of children aged 10-14 years old (1.9 million or 48%) and 15-17 years old (1.8 million or 46%).
• There were more male working children (2.5 million or 62.3%) than female working children (1.5 million or 36.6%). Seven out of ten working children resided in the rural areas.
• 25.1% of the children worked in the evening or during night time. The proportion of children working during night time in the urban areas (39%) was greater than that in the rural areas (19%); more males than females.
• More than half of the total number of the children surveyed (51.2% or 2 million) worked between 1 to 4 hours a day.
• Over third of the children worked from 5 – 8 hours in a day and the remaining 9% worked for more than 8 hours per week.
• About 2.4 million of working children were exposed to physical and chemical hazards and were in physical and biologically hazardous working places. 23% suffered from work-related injuries.
• One third of working children did not attend school. Seven in every ten working children (65.9% or 2.6 million) attended school.
• 34% of these children dropped out from school and 22% reported that their work interferes with their schooling.
• Two in every five working children stopped/dropped out of school. The ratio or male working child to female working children in terms of dropouts was 2:1.
• Reasons given for dropping out school include loss of interest (31.4%), and high cost of schooling (28.3%).