Proyecto Semilla (Seed Project): Combating Exploitative Rural Child Labor in Peru

Reduce exploitative child labor in agriculture and in rural areas through the following objectives:

• Provide direct educational services to targeted children and sustainable livelihood services to members of their households;
• Support national institutions to improve policies, programs, and delivery of education, social protection, and sustainable livelihood services;
• Raise awareness of exploitative child labor and its root causes and the importance of education for all children;
• Mobilize stakeholders to improve and expand educational opportunities;
• Support research and the collection of reliable data on child labor and its root causes, as well as effective strategies to address it; and
• Ensure long-term sustainability of these efforts.

Summary of Activities:

The project is designed to reach these objectives through the following activities:

• Provide educational support and vocational training to targeted children, including academic leveling, tutoring, and after-school programs to help children succeed and stay in school; 
• Improve the quality of rural schools, especially multi-grade schools, through teacher support and training, improvements to school equipment, and increased community involvement in schools;
• Provide livelihood support to targeted families involved in agriculture and seasonal migration for informal work. Support includes training and peerto-peer assistance on improving crop yields and harvest management, connecting targeted families to existing social protection services, and the introduction of technological improvements that can replace child labor in agricultural production.
• Provide technical support, capacity-building initiatives, and facilitate regional exchanges for local and national government institutions to improve policies, legislation, and service delivery;
• Provide technical assistance and facilitate regional exchanges for indigenous and civil society organizations to foment their coordination with government institutions on child labor issues;
• Raise awareness on child labor and the importance of education throughout the target areas and across all levels of project stakeholders; and
• Conduct research and disseminate findings on the impact of government social protection systems on exploitative child labor, the relationship between household characteristics and child labor, and the specific occupational hazards associated with child labor.
• Provide technical support to government ministries and regional governments so they can fully adopt education and livelihood programs to combat child labor, as well as systems to monitor and evaluate those programs.
• Provide technical support to government ministries and regional governments to include child labor issues in their policies and programs.