Jurema Suburb

CHILDREN-BRAZIL: Hunger, Poverty Create Breeding-Ground for Social Ills
In Brazil, Latin America's giant, 32 million children and adolescents live in families with incomes of less than 40 dollars a month.

In this country of 178 million, poverty pushes school-age children into the world of work and creates a breeding-ground for social ills like malnutrition, sexual exploitation, and violence against children.

Although there are no reliable statistics on child labour in Brazil, an estimated three million children under 14 work, 40 percent of them in agriculture, where the worst conditions are found and where work is generally incompatible with school attendance.
According to statistics from the National Confederation of Agricultural Workers, minors working on plantations cut an average of 2.3 tons of sugar cane a day, doing arduous work at an age at which their bone and muscle systems are not yet fully developed.

As adults they often suffer irreversible limb and joint problems and are at risk of cardiac and respiratory ailments. An International Labour Organisation (ILO) report released last week found that Brazil has the third largest number of minors working in domestic service -- a total of 559,000 -- surpassed only by South Africa and Indonesia. Most of them are girls who are kept by their employers as signs of social status. Very few of the domestics are able to attend school, and they frequently receive no remuneration, but merely room and board and minimal clothing, which relieves the pressure on their impoverished families by reducing the number of mouths to feed.
Sexual exploitation is another problem to which poor children in Brazil are vulnerable. But legislation promoted by various administrations.Violence is another serious problem facing minors in certain sectors of society. Every day, an average of four children and adolescents in Brazil are killed by the police, other minors, or common criminals. In addition, juvenile delinquents are subjected to harsh punishment when they are captured. Government reform schools inspire such fear that adolescents frequently try to pass themselves off as old enough to be sent to prison instead.
A report presented by non-governmental organisations in Brazil to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child on Jun. 11 cites the progress made in the fight against malnutrition and in expanding primary school coverage in Brazil, but states that the country still has a long way to go towards ensuring respect for the rights of children who run into problems with the law.