Child Labor and the New Global Marketplace; Reaping Profits at the Expense of Children? Hearing Before the Subcommittee on Labor of the Committee on Labor and Human Resources, United States Senate, One Hundred Third Congress, Second Session

Excerpt from Child Labor and the New Global Marketplace; Reaping Profits at the Expense of Children?: Hearing Before the Subcommittee on Labor of the Committee on Labor and Human Resources, United States Senate, One Hundred Third Congress, Second Session

I am here today to tell you about the child abor situation in Dhaka, with particular emphasis on the prospects for a construe tive solution. I can say at the outset, without hesitation, that there has been progress, and this progress can be exclusively attributed to the introduction of the harkin-brown bill, which would prohibit products made with child labor from being exported to the us.

I started working full-time in a garment factory when I was 11 years old. By the time I was 15 years, I worked regularly in three different factories. Many other children were working alongside me. The conditions were unhealthy, and the hours were ong. When I started, I worked over 70 hours a week for just 300 taka per month, or roughly us$8.

We were often paid late, forced to work overtime, and we were bitten, slapped, and had our ears pulled for making mistakes or being late.

Bangladesh has had a law since 1965 prohibiting child labor for children under age 14. This law was ignored. Only when the Har kin bill was introduced did the factory owners get concerned and begin hiding the children when the foreign buyers came.

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