Key Findings

• 64 % of all auditors and 71 % from China encountered suspected child labor cases in the past 2 years

• 82 % of all those ( 85 % in China ) reported confirmed cases

According to ILO , the Asia and the Pacific region experienced a remarkable decline in child labor in recent years . However , it still has the largest number of working children – almost 78 million or 9.3 % of the

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child population by 2012 . Although most child labor incidents are found in the

agricultural and service sectors , with only

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7 % in industry , the result of the auditor survey confirms that child labor risks still exist in the first tier supply chains of international brands , and probably to a greater extent than what some may have expected . It may come as a surprise that the auditors from China encountered more child labor on average than their counterparts in the region . In the past two years , an auditor from China confirmed close to two child labor cases on average . It is fair to mention that the difference in child labor cases in

Figure 3 :

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No . of child cases auditors discovered in the past 2 years various countries may or may not reflect the actual situation in the manufacturing sector because the difference could be caused by the variance in sample sizes ( China accounts for up to 70 % of the total sample ), the auditors ’ employers and the brands and sectors they were auditing for in the past two years . Furthermore , a point of consideration is that China has the highest minimum legal working age ( 16 years old ) out of all of the countries covered in this report . When we look at the age groups of discovered child labor cases , we can see that more than 4 out of 5 cases ( 82 %) in China are 15 and above , while this number is less ( 73 %) for other countries . Note that in other countries 15 is not considered child labor by law but some companies have set the minimum working age in their supply chains higher than the legal minimum age . That being said , the results do indicate that it might still be too early to assume that child labor is no longer a risk factor in China ’ s manufacturing industry .

Best Response : Auditors ’ Insights on Child Labor in Asia 4