Children performing hazardous labor constitute in some respects the silent majority of children compelled to work. In fact, they are ignored most of the time as attention is mainly given to more notorious cases such as soldier or slave children. They are also neglected in the series of initiatives regarding child-work in general.
This study is intended to partially unveil the case of children performing hazardous labor by looking at the various parameters of their constraints to work. Its ultimate goal is to find out the profile of the children’s constraints and the factors that compel them to do so when we focus only on the active ones. We have established the fact that 69.3 per cent of the children economically active are involved in dangerous activities. The relationship between the social, demographic and economic variables and the constraints to dangerous work have been studied in an empirical manner using the data of the national survey on the children work done in 2008, referring to the descriptive exploratory and econometric analysis.
The analysis of the results of this study reveals that the most compelled children to the dangerous work are those living in the poor households. Moreover these children are illiterate and their parents are not married. At last, it stems from the study that the child’s age and his relationship to the person in charge explain significantly the risk of constraints to dangerous works. This study also highlights that children that are not living with their biological parents are likely to be exposed to dangerous work.
As a consequence, this document should be considered as a call to public authorities while recommending specific action of girl literacy improvement policy and safety on the work place for all workers, but with specific protection measures for young ones between the minimum employment age and that of eighteen.
Keys words : Dangerous labor, Profile, Working child, Schooling and Poverty.
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