Eliminate Exploitive Child Labor through Education and Economic Development (EXCEED)

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Country
Project Duration
September 2009
-
March 2014
Funding and Year
FY
2009
: USD
5,500,000

The goal of the project was to reduce the overall number of children involved in and at risk of engaging in exploitive child labor.

The Problem

Indonesia has one of the largest populations of children in the world, and estimates suggest that millions of them are involved in exploitive child labor. The majority of work by children in Indonesia occurs in rural areas, where children work in plantation agriculture. Children also work as domestic servants and are involved in commercial sexual exploitation. Trafficking of women and children continues to be a major problem. The Government of Indonesia is implementing a 20-year National Action Plan (NAP) to Eliminate the Worst Forms of Child Labor, and the law prohibits children from engaging in any work that can harm their health, safety or morals. 

Our Strategy

Targets:

The project targeted the following provinces and municipalities: West Java (Bandung); Central Java (Semarang, Yogya); East Java (Surabaya); South Sumatra (Lampung); and West Kalimantan (Pontianak, Singkawang, Sambas, Sanggau).

The project accomplished the following specific objectives:

  • Provided educational and social services by sector to withdraw children from exploitive child labor or prevent children from entering such labor;
  • Improved the enabling environment to combat child labor by increasing the capacity of stakeholders (particularly at the local level) to implement the NAP and ensure sustainability;
  • Increased awareness of the worst forms of child labor and the importance of education for all children; and
  • Conducted research on child labor to better understand its root causes.

Results

The project withdrew 6,130 and prevented 5,293 children from exploitive work as domestic servants, on plantations (specifically palm oil), as street children (particularly girls), and from being trafficked for commercial sexual exploitation or forced labor. 

  • Provided educational services to children, including a mix of formal education, non-formal education, skills training, and the creation of farm schools in West Kalimantan; 
  • Established community support and reintegration centers to provide individualized care for children being withdrawn from exploitive labor who are in need of such care; 
  • Linked up with apprenticeship and internship programs to provide alternate livelihood options for withdrawn children; 
  • Created a web-based data entry system (FieldLink Indonesia) to track, analyze, document and evaluate all data on program beneficiaries; 
  • Formed working groups to address child labor at the national and local levels; 
  • Conducted of a national survey and two small-scale studies on children working in plantation agriculture and children engaged in CSEC; and 
  • Executed public campaigns to raise awareness on child labor issues and the importance of education.  
  • A total of 11,423 children were withdrawn and prevented from exploitative child labor as a result of this project.
Grantee:
Save the Children
Implementing Partners:
Local NGO Partners
Contact Information:
(202) 693-4843 / Office of Child Labor, Forced Labor, and Human Trafficking (OCFT)
Tags:
Child Labor
Agriculture
Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children (CSEC)
Domestic Work
Evaluations
Palm Oil
Street Children