Contexts Analysis and Study of Causes of the Exploitation of Children in Agricultural Activities (Case Study: Mahidasht Dehestan of Kermanshah County)

In many low-income countries, agriculture forms a large portion of economic activities and a high proportion of employment. Boys and girls throughout history have formed part of the agricultural workforce. Major part of the food and drink that we consume, are produced by child labor in agricultural activities, that this phenomenon is more common in developing and developed countries.
THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK: Child labor is a persistent problem worldwide, especially in developing countries. Children form over half the world's population and play a significant role in agriculture. Article I of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, "child" is to be defined: » A child is human beings under the age of eighteen years, unless according to the law applicable to the child, the age of Maturity is detected fewer «. The reasons why employers hire children in the agricultural sector can be divided into 5 categories, which include the following: 1- Lack or non-enforcement of regulations and laws; 2- Children as a cheap source of labour; 3- Rural development and employment; 4- Fair globalization and access to international markets; 5- The global agri-food industry and child labour, and the role of consumers. In general we can say that the main causes of child labor in agricultural activities, including economic factors (poverty, unemployment, the gap, children as cheap labor), social factors (lack of child protection laws, lack of child protection organizations, obedient children and their easy management), family factors (family size, parental awareness of children's needs), and cultural factors (false beliefs as children as a source of income, the need for participation of children in agriculture, keeping the family tradition and limited access to education).
Purpose of this research is contexts analysis and study of causes of the exploitation of children in agricultural activities in rural areas. The population included three groups. The first group includes children 5 to 18 years (N=934), the second group includes parents that their children work on farms, and the third group includes experts who are relevant to child labor (N=30). In the first group (children), a sample of 272 members was selected using Krejcie and Morgan (1970) sampling table and the stratified random sampling method with proportional allocation. In the second group (parents), due to the lack of accurate statistics about the parents, purposeful sampling was used. In the third group, (experts) the enumeration is done. Data were collected through structured questionnaire that its validity is confirmed by expert’s panel and its reliability was assessed by Cranach’s alpha (Causes α = 0/83 and children's activities α = 0/95). The collected data were analyzed through SPSS18.
Based on the results, girls most active in areas such as weeding out the field (average = 4/5), picking product (average= 4/1), water the animals (average= 3/96) and cleaning the place of animals (average= 3/5) and boys most active in areas such as picking product (average= 4), thrashing (average= 3/97), transferring product to the warehouse (average= 3/84). The reasons for employing children, according to research results, are expressed as creating accountability (average= 4/33), cheap use of children (average= 4/25), being clever and agile (average= 4/24). While parents noted factors such as lack of parent’s awareness of the dangers of child labor (average= 4/19), being cheap (average= 4/06) and being obedient (average= 3/94). The experts said that the main reason for using child labor such as being cheap use of family labor (average= 4/6), family poverty (average= 4/53) and the disabled their parents (average= 4/31). According to the results of research on the causes of exploitation of children in agricultural activities from the perspective of the three groups, it might be argued that similarities can be found at all three groups. Because all three groups believe that cheaper the use of children for parents, the main reason is their use of children. Because parents do not give to children money against what they do and this the cause is that more income Given the family. Results correlation analysis shows that there is a significant positive relationship among the children's activities with amount of irrigated land and their families light and heavy livestock; that's mean with increasing levels of irrigated land and having more light and heavy livestock, increase the children's activities that this is the logical because having irrigated land needs more work and this also applies about more livestock.
According to the results, the average income of rural households (Less than 100 million riyals in the year) on the other hand, lack a second job in the child custody case, recommend the diversification of sources of rural income with business education in rural areas has improved the income of rural households, that parent use of skilled workers instead the use of forced their child. in this way make less pressure to their children, escape from vicious trap and also increase productivity and performance in rural areas. It was observed that with the increase of age and the increase in their ability, Increased The volume of work assigned to them, As the ages of 15 to 17 years had most workloads. However, the continuing education is the only way out of the vicious circle and to academic success reduce the workload in this age, therefore it is suggested the action to alert parents in to preference children's education.