Child trafficking
'If only I get enough money for a bicycle!' a study of childhoods, migration and adolescent aspirations against a backdrop of exploitation and trafficking in Burkina Faso.
Do agencies fully understand adolescent migration?
Authors:
D, Thorsen; Nordic Africa Institute
Publisher:
Development Research Centre on Migration, Globalisation and Poverty, University of Sussex, 2007
Focusing on adolescent’s independent migration to rural towns and urban areas, this paper explores how international and national agencies’ perceptions correspond with the common perceptions of childhood in rural area. It also investigates how rural adolescents describe their mobility.
The paper argues for a need to situate the way in which childhood is conceptualised in its appropriate context to understand the choices that parents and adolescents make. If the vulnerabilities that rural children and young people experience at home and as migrants are to be addressed, it’s crucial to engage in a discussion of acceptable working conditions and forms of work for children of different ages.
Key recommendations include:
- to meet the long-term goal of basic literacy and numeracy among the rural population, the shortcomings of the formal educational system need to be addressed
- to meet more immediate goals of enhancing the opportunities of the current generation of adolescent boys and girls, their employment situation needs to be addressed
- it is key that gender inequalities are addressed by providing remunerated employment opportunities to adolescent girls while at the same time protecting their respectability and securing their family’s approval.
