The Yen Daakye Movement, a civil society organisation which seeks to support community driven initiatives for the elimination of the worst forms of child labour and forced labour in the growing and marketing of cocoa in Ghana has made significant achievements in eliminating child labour.
Under its pilot phase, the movement reached out to 17,521 persons in three districts. They are Adansi South, 7,221 persons; Mpohor Wassa East District, 2,873 persons and the Wassa Amenfi West District, 7,427 persons. The project sought to work with the entire community in the 24 communities in the three districts from. Thus dialogue and sensitisation on child labour and related concepts and the formulation and validation of community action plans were done as community wide activities. The programme is presently being implemented in 158 communities in 7 districts.
Following the initiative, today communities have owned up to the existence of worse form of child labour, forced labour and abuses of the rights of the child, they have identified the causes of worse form of child labour and forced labour and taken practical measures to address them and made changes in labour and social practices that are unfavourable to the child.
Also in 21 communities, children are no longer directly involved in spraying of cocoa. They fetch water for spraying the day before it takes place. Nineteen communities have taken measures to reduce the load children carry, eight communities have taken measures including adopting bye-laws against children clearing land and felling trees. In 24 communities, there are parents and guardians who have started providing protective clothing for children when they accompany them to the farms. Twenty-one communities have taken measures to see to the proper disposal of pesticide containers used for cocoa spraying and also for adults to wash spraying machines after use, among other things.
The organisation carries out its activities through a child-centred development approach, causing change in attitudes from adult-centred development to child-centred development -development that places premium on children and seeks to safeguard their future. It also seeks to change top-down solutions and actions, to community-driven solutions and actions.
The name Yen Daakye is an Akan phrase mean which translates literally as “Our Future.” It was chosen to stress the need and urgency to change their current labour practices if they wanted a future for their children and livelihoods.
The Movement is borne out of the Yen Daakye project, which is of community driven initiatives for the elimination of the worst forms of child labour sponsored by the International Cocoa Initiative (ICI). The initiative was necessitated by international threats to boycott the purchase of cocoa from West Africa if action was not taken to eliminate worst forms of child labour in the cocoa sector.
The project started with a pilot phase in three districts- two in the Western Region and one in Ashanti Region, with a total of 24 communities. In the communities, local implementing partners were responsible for supporting communities implement their action plans. The three implementing partners were Hope for Humanity (HFH) in New Edubiase, Community Development Consult (Codesult) in Asankrangwa, and SCMPP in Daboase.
Participatory Development Associates (PDA), as the local co-ordinating agency (LCA) helped to design, inform, co-ordinate, and monitor the implementation by the implementing partners. PDA also implemented the programme directly in six communities in Asankrangwa.
Training and technical backstopping, on worst forms of child labour and its related concepts was provided by Rescue Foundation. The pilot phase lasted a period of 25 months from November 2004 to December 2006.
The successful implementation of the pilot phase culminated in the project being scaled up in February 2007 with new implementing partners undergoing training. These are: Global Responses Initiative (GLORI) in Wasa Amenfi West District of the Western Region Help Advance Community Opportunities Goals (HACOG) in Mpohor Wassa East, Safe Life for All Foundation (SLF) in Adansi South, PROMAG in Sefwi Wiawso in the Western Region, Rural Environmental Care Association (RECA) in Wasa Amenfi East (Wassa Akropong) - Western Region and Oasis Foundation in the Assin North District (Assin Fosu) - Central Region
Based on this analysis, the International Cocoa Initiative /Participatory Development Associate approach in the pilot and in the scale-up phase engaged various stakeholders in the community (leaders, men, women, youth, children, teachers) in dialogue and sensitisation processes, which provided them with information on the rights of the child, child trafficking and related laws and international conventions. More importantly, the process enabled community members to reflect on the vulnerability of the child, analyse the risks and hazards to which they put their children.
Invariably, they come to their own conclusions as to what actions to take to end the worst forms of child labour. Community actions to end Worst Form of Child Labour were captured as Community Action Plans (CAPs). CAPs include decisions taken by the community to improve child welfare and maintenance at both the household and community level, as well as improving on education, health and nutrition of children. Decisions make provision for or the improvement of school infrastructure or the environment. The communities used their CAPs to mobilise resources from within and outside their communities, notable are district authorities. Communities review their CAPs and draw new ones, based on their ten-year vision of what they would like to see their children become. Most communities have implemented nearly 80 per cent of their plans.
Based on this outcome, all the partners of the pilot phase came to the conclusion that to eliminate the worst forms of child labour and eventually child labour in totality, requires attitudinal change, change from adult-centred development to child-centred development, from top-down solutions and actions, to community-driven solutions and actions. This resolve led to the formation of the YDK Movement to champion these resolutions and also advocate for the development of children in rural communities
Daily Graphic, Tuesday, June 15,2010