BUSA JEREMIAH WENOGO
THE O’Neill government’s recent move to tackle child protection issues through the revised Lukautim Pikinini (Child Protection) Act is to be highly commended.
In Port Moresby alone the number of street kids is rising at an alarming rate and it is high time measures were taken to take these kids off the street.
A 2011 survey on child labour sponsored by the International Labour Organisation showed we are only scratching the surface of the problem.
And as employment opportunities become scarce and more people migrate from rural to urban centres, this problem is getting worse.
Furthermore, increased investment in large-scale extractive projects in remote areas has a tendency to expose rural communities to socio-economic problems never experienced before in their lives.
As more societies in PNG become monetised and consumption patterns change, people are more likely to go in search of money-making activities to satisfy their desires.
While it is commendable for the government to introduce a law to address the needs of our children, it is equally important for it to understand why these kids are on the street in the first place.
The ILO survey clearly indicated that most of these kids are engaged in economic activities, legal and illegal. It found that, of the 229 children who took part, 68% were engaged in chopping firewood for sale, moving furniture, loading and unloading boxes from containers, controlling traffic and collecting scrap metal.
This could indicate that their parents are largely unemployed and don’t have access to income earning opportunities to support their families. The children are sent to work to generate money to support the family.
This could also explain the reason why, even though the government has introduced free tuition, there are still many kids on the street.
For an unemployed parent living on the economic fringe it is a huge problem to balance out the family’s needs against the child’s well-being.
To put a child into school instead of work would mean the loss of an economic lifeline. It may seem inhumane yet this is the reality.
In addition, when the child is in school, he or she may not be able to stay there too long given the lack of resources to support the ancillaries to learning, like lunch money and bus fares.
In Port Moresby, one of the world’s most expensive cities, the reality on the ground is of untold strife for the majority of parents who are trying to raise children.
The majority of these unfortunate and jobless people in PNG are engaged in the informal economy (including agriculture), engaged in various trades just to make enough bucks to get by. The government should support the positive aspects of the informal economy as a safety net to help these parents generate some income to support their families.
Sadly, over the years and even today the government has deliberately ignored the role of the informal economy in addressing pressing socio-economic development issues, although 85%-90% of PNG’s population is engaged in the informal economy directly or indirectly.
While the government is pressing on with initiatives to stimulate the small to medium-sized enterprise (SME) sector, the truth is that most of our people don’t have the basic requirements to make a quick leap forward to become SMEs.
In fact the government, by deliberately avoiding the informal economy, is working against these initiatives. Attempts to kill informal sector growth through heavy-handed tactics and imposing bans will defeat much-needed reform.
Growing the informal economy in PNG means investing in financial inclusion and financial literacy to develop a savings culture among informal economy workers.
In addition it encompasses the need to provide appropriate tangible (e.g. market facilities) and intangible (e.g. law and order) public goods and services.
The ILO survey on child labour and the various measures being adopted by the government at various levels to tackle issues relating to children’s rights warrants a more serious and comprehensive look at the informal economy in PNG.
The government should now undertake a comprehensive national audit exercise to take stock of the informal economy in PNG before embarking on harsher measures against the informal economy participants.
The project should establish the nature and range of informal economy activities or micro-enterprises that the informal economy participants in PNG are currently engaged in.
In addition, the project should identify the nature and range of informal economy activities in PNG including providing a comparative analysis of the informal economy activities in countries with similar development context as PNG in the Asia-Pacific region.
Eventually the project will contribute to a much clearer and concise picture of the informal economy activities (the types of micro-enterprises and products): the challenges and opportunities in enhancing and expanding the range and types of informal economy activities in PNG including recommending a pathway for the development of this sector to become a vibrant and effective sector.
THE O’Neill government’s recent move to tackle child protection issues through the revised Lukautim Pikinini (Child Protection) Act is to be highly commended.
A 2011 survey on child labour sponsored by the International Labour Organisation showed we are only scratching the surface of the problem.
And as employment opportunities become scarce and more people migrate from rural to urban centres, this problem is getting worse.
Furthermore, increased investment in large-scale extractive projects in remote areas has a tendency to expose rural communities to socio-economic problems never experienced before in their lives.
As more societies in PNG become monetised and consumption patterns change, people are more likely to go in search of money-making activities to satisfy their desires.
While it is commendable for the government to introduce a law to address the needs of our children, it is equally important for it to understand why these kids are on the street in the first place.
The ILO survey clearly indicated that most of these kids are engaged in economic activities, legal and illegal. It found that, of the 229 children who took part, 68% were engaged in chopping firewood for sale, moving furniture, loading and unloading boxes from containers, controlling traffic and collecting scrap metal.
This could indicate that their parents are largely unemployed and don’t have access to income earning opportunities to support their families. The children are sent to work to generate money to support the family.
This could also explain the reason why, even though the government has introduced free tuition, there are still many kids on the street.
For an unemployed parent living on the economic fringe it is a huge problem to balance out the family’s needs against the child’s well-being.
To put a child into school instead of work would mean the loss of an economic lifeline. It may seem inhumane yet this is the reality.
In addition, when the child is in school, he or she may not be able to stay there too long given the lack of resources to support the ancillaries to learning, like lunch money and bus fares.
In Port Moresby, one of the world’s most expensive cities, the reality on the ground is of untold strife for the majority of parents who are trying to raise children.
The majority of these unfortunate and jobless people in PNG are engaged in the informal economy (including agriculture), engaged in various trades just to make enough bucks to get by. The government should support the positive aspects of the informal economy as a safety net to help these parents generate some income to support their families.
Sadly, over the years and even today the government has deliberately ignored the role of the informal economy in addressing pressing socio-economic development issues, although 85%-90% of PNG’s population is engaged in the informal economy directly or indirectly.
While the government is pressing on with initiatives to stimulate the small to medium-sized enterprise (SME) sector, the truth is that most of our people don’t have the basic requirements to make a quick leap forward to become SMEs.
In fact the government, by deliberately avoiding the informal economy, is working against these initiatives. Attempts to kill informal sector growth through heavy-handed tactics and imposing bans will defeat much-needed reform.
Growing the informal economy in PNG means investing in financial inclusion and financial literacy to develop a savings culture among informal economy workers.
In addition it encompasses the need to provide appropriate tangible (e.g. market facilities) and intangible (e.g. law and order) public goods and services.
The ILO survey on child labour and the various measures being adopted by the government at various levels to tackle issues relating to children’s rights warrants a more serious and comprehensive look at the informal economy in PNG.
The government should now undertake a comprehensive national audit exercise to take stock of the informal economy in PNG before embarking on harsher measures against the informal economy participants.
The project should establish the nature and range of informal economy activities or micro-enterprises that the informal economy participants in PNG are currently engaged in.
In addition, the project should identify the nature and range of informal economy activities in PNG including providing a comparative analysis of the informal economy activities in countries with similar development context as PNG in the Asia-Pacific region.
Eventually the project will contribute to a much clearer and concise picture of the informal economy activities (the types of micro-enterprises and products): the challenges and opportunities in enhancing and expanding the range and types of informal economy activities in PNG including recommending a pathway for the development of this sector to become a vibrant and effective sector.
As more societies in PNG become monetised and consumption patterns change, people are more likely to go in search of money-making activities to satisfy their desires.
While it is commendable for the government to introduce a law to address the needs of our children, it is equally important for it to understand why these kids are on the street in the first place.
The ILO survey clearly indicated that most of these kids are engaged in economic activities, legal and illegal. It found that, of the 229 children who took part, 68% were engaged in chopping firewood for sale, moving furniture, loading and unloading boxes from containers, controlling traffic and collecting scrap metal.
This could indicate that their parents are largely unemployed and don’t have access to income earning opportunities to support their families. The children are sent to work to generate money to support the family.
This could also explain the reason why, even though the government has introduced free tuition, there are still many kids on the street.
For an unemployed parent living on the economic fringe it is a huge problem to balance out the family’s needs against the child’s well-being.
To put a child into school instead of work would mean the loss of an economic lifeline. It may seem inhumane yet this is the reality.
In addition, when the child is in school, he or she may not be able to stay there too long given the lack of resources to support the ancillaries to learning, like lunch money and bus fares.
In Port Moresby, one of the world’s most expensive cities, the reality on the ground is of untold strife for the majority of parents who are trying to raise children.
The majority of these unfortunate and jobless people in PNG are engaged in the informal economy (including agriculture), engaged in various trades just to make enough bucks to get by. The government should support the positive aspects of the informal economy as a safety net to help these parents generate some income to support their families.
Sadly, over the years and even today the government has deliberately ignored the role of the informal economy in addressing pressing socio-economic development issues, although 85%-90% of PNG’s population is engaged in the informal economy directly or indirectly.
While the government is pressing on with initiatives to stimulate the small to medium-sized enterprise (SME) sector, the truth is that most of our people don’t have the basic requirements to make a quick leap forward to become SMEs.
In fact the government, by deliberately avoiding the informal economy, is working against these initiatives. Attempts to kill informal sector growth through heavy-handed tactics and imposing bans will defeat much-needed reform.
Growing the informal economy in PNG means investing in financial inclusion and financial literacy to develop a savings culture among informal economy workers.
In addition it encompasses the need to provide appropriate tangible (e.g. market facilities) and intangible (e.g. law and order) public goods and services.
The ILO survey on child labour and the various measures being adopted by the government at various levels to tackle issues relating to children’s rights warrants a more serious and comprehensive look at the informal economy in PNG.
The government should now undertake a comprehensive national audit exercise to take stock of the informal economy in PNG before embarking on harsher measures against the informal economy participants.
The project should establish the nature and range of informal economy activities or micro-enterprises that the informal economy participants in PNG are currently engaged in.
In addition, the project should identify the nature and range of informal economy activities in PNG including providing a comparative analysis of the informal economy activities in countries with similar development context as PNG in the Asia-Pacific region.
Eventually the project will contribute to a much clearer and concise picture of the informal economy activities (the types of micro-enterprises and products): the challenges and opportunities in enhancing and expanding the range and types of informal economy activities in PNG including recommending a pathway for the development of this sector to become a vibrant and effective sector.
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