Slavery

Sometimes children are forced to do jobs where they may get seriously injured, or even killed!

Did you know that a lot of people around the world are in slavery? In some countries, almost half of the people are slaves!

Did you know that some people sell their children for as little as thirty dollars?

Kids stand in their local market, just waiting to be sold. Not possible, right? Wrong! More than 200,000 kids are sold every year. It's really sad, and parents sell their kids for many different reasons.

Sometimes, parents just want extra money, and once they have that money, they won't have to spend it feeding their child. Some parents didn't think carefully about giving birth and just didn't want their children anymore. Some parents sell their kids because they're poor and think their child will be happier elsewhere. When or if they are sold, they're not sold as children, but as slaves. A lot of the time though, parents aren't to blame. The children are kidnapped from their parents to be sold. Some children are sold for as little as $30 dollars. Imagine, $30 for a whole kid!

In the United Kingdom, some people buy children from Africa. The people pretend to want to be their parents, but end up using them as slaves. The government will give them benefits, or money, for having the children but they don't want a family, just slaves.

In the Ivory Coast of Africa, up to 15,000 children are living as slaves and working to make cocoa. Most of these children have been kidnapped from their parents. The cocoa these children produce goes on to make half the chocolate in the world! Other countries that sell child slaves include Angola, Sudan, Somalia, Chad, Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Cote d'Ivoire, Gabon, Nigeria and Togo.

Some child slaves have to do very hard physical jobs, such as move large rocks or carry heavy bags for long distances. Some work as servants in houses, cleaning and cooking all day long.

Even though some parents think their kids will be happier somewhere else, most are not as happy as their parents had hoped. The kids always miss their families. The hours the children work are always long and the work is always hard. Usually they don't have very good food either. And there is never any pay!

Citations

Web Sites

BBC. "CBBC Newsround World"
<http://news.bbc.co.uk/cbbcnews/> (February, 2004).

Anti-Slavery International. "Child Slavery."
<http://www.antislavery.org/homepage/antislavery/childlabour.htm> (February, 2004).

Images

Images of money, flag, and cooking things from "Microsoft Office Online" <http://office.microsoft.com/clipart/default.aspx?cag=1> Images free for non-profit and personal use. (October-February, 2003-2004).