Children’s Rights in the Workplace Programme for Footwear and Apparel Manufacturers

UNICEF’s “Children’s Rights in the Workplace Programme for Garment Manufacturers” was expanded beyond Bangladesh to Vietnam, reflecting the country’s booming apparel and footwear industry, which employs an estimated 3.5 million workers. The “Children’s Rights in the Workplace Programme for Apparel and Footwear Manufacturers” rolled out in Vietnam by UNICEF was implemented by The Centre for Child Rights and Business in 2019. The programme involved training and supporting 11 factories in seven thematic areas: breastfeeding, maternity protection, health & nutrition, parenting, young workers, child labour/childcare and WASH.

Key outcomes of the programme included:

• Of the four factories which chose to improve on breastfeeding and maternity protection, three successfully established lactation rooms for women employees and workers started to use the lactation rooms and facilities there to keep their breast milk.

• Four factories made advances in health & nutrition by organising awareness raising sessions among workers, changes to the menu to include a more versatile and nutritious selection and upgrading the canteen and providing food storage lockers

• One factory hired 96 young workers aged from 16 to 25, and of these 8 were between 16-18 years old. They were assigned work suitable for them and did not feel much tired after work day according to the impact assessment

• One factory installed new water purifiers so workers don't have to go to the canteen to collect drinking water anymore and the water purifiers are located right at their work stations

• One factory raised awareness on child labour prevention with all of their sub-contractors and service providers and signed agreements with 10 main sub-contractors on child labour prevention and young worker protection. The factory also established a “Happy School” project to provide workers with childcare allowance. 200 children received such an allowance and scholarships were provided to 600 children between the range of 1,100,000 VND to 3,300,000 VND (incl. special scholarships to senior workers’ children to complete university)