By EuAsiaNews,
Brussels : About 8000 children , nearly 25% of the work force, are working under hazardous conditions in shipbreaking yards in Bangladesh, according to a report presented at the European Parliament in Brussels Tuesday.
The International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) and Young Power in Social Action (YPSA-Bangladesh) in cooperation with the International NGO Platform on Shipbreaking published a fact-finding mission report entitled “Childbreaking Yards: Child labour in the ship recycling industry in Bangladesh”.
Muhammad Ali Shahin of YPSA told a press conference that poverty, loss of land and disappearance of the father are the main causes behind the high rate of childworkers on the yards.
The report notes that shipbreaking is a key industry in Bangladesh and a highly hazardous activity. It attracts extremely poor farmers and migrant workers, as working in the yards provides them with higher income than agricultural work.
Accidents occur on a daily basis on the yards, leaving many workers severely injured and somedead. Around 10% of the workers are under 12 years old.
Ingvild Jenssen of the NGO Platform on Shipbreaking said many of the ships dismantled in Bangladesh are European ships and 60% dismantling of the world fleet is done in Bangladesh.
The EU must take responsibility to improve the situation, she said.
Last year, 100 ships were dismantled in Bangladesh.
After 25 to 30 years ships are at the end of their operational life. These ‘end-of-life’ vessels are sold and dismantled to recover valuable steel.
However, ships also contain large amounts of hazardous materials.
Shipbreaking today occurs mostly in yards on the beaches of South Asian countries. Bangladesh, as well as India and Pakistan, offer low operating costs because of cheap labour, absence of expensive machinery, but also, disregard for labour and environmental standards.
This situation will be aggravated by the number of ships going out of service in the next few years following the global phase out of single hull oil tankers, the large estimated backlog of old vessels still operating because of high freight rates and the general boom in shipbuilding over the last years.
The toxic wastes on board ‘end-of-life’ vessels are being freely traded without restraint in the global market place, states the report.
The report underlines that the problem is very complex: ending shipbreaking in Bangladesh is certainly not the solution.
This activity provides job opportunities to tens of thousands of workers, and the country does not have the possibility to buy steel on the international market and therefore relies on recycled steel scrapped from ships.
The report states that the government of Bangladesh holds however a clear responsibility to ensure respect of domestic legislation in the yards, and to harmonize the laws of the country with international human rights and environmental standards.
The report recommends to the EU to ensure a transfer of expertise on clean ship dismantling to Bangladesh and other shipbreaking countries and fund programmes to eradicate child labour in hazardous sectors in Bangladesh.