Factory in Egypt Strengthens Child Labour Prevention Mechanism Following Child Labour Remediation Programme

In 2020, The Centre supported a client with two child labour remediation cases in its supply chain in Egypt. 

The cases in 2020 involved two 14-year-old girls who were found in a factory producing medical devices by an external auditor in 2020. The minimum age to work in Egypt is 15. The girls began working at the factory after their school closed because of the pandemic. 

Upon conducting interviews with all concerned stakeholders, a remediation programme was agreed upon and initiated in October of that year that included supporting the girls’ tuition and private tutoring until they reach the legal minimum working age and strengthening the factory’s HR process by reviewing their hiring and child labour policy, strengthening the awareness and capability of key factory staff in preventing child labour and conducting regular internal inspections.

The remediation programme not only ensured that the children returned to school and did not engage in child labour, the factory management also gained important skills in preventing future instances of child labour. A 6-hour training in December 2020 enabled the factory to identify the gaps and risks in their internal management, understand how to improve their management system and resulted in the development of a concrete action plan together with the trainer of The Centre to stamp out any future cases of child labour.