Over 10,800 children between the ages of four and 18 are estimated to be working in Mica mines in Madagascar. Mica, a group of silicate minerals mainly extracted in India and Madagascar, is largely used in the production of electronics, cosmetics, or cars due to its ability to transmit electric force without overheating. Children face extremely hazardous conditions on a daily basis so that consumers around the globe can buy their automobiles, microwaves or cosmetics at market prices. Children as young as four years old are forced to work from 5am to 6-7 pm extracting the material with their bare hands. Child labour is highest in the poorest and most underdeveloped countries. They garner the perfect conditions for labour exploitation due to their weak laws and general lack of regulation. A report published by the International Labor Organization in 2018 estimated that over 152 million children in the world have been forced into child labour, of which at least 73 million work in extreme and hazardous conditions.

According to the International Labor Organization, child labour “refers to work that is either dangerous or harmful to children (or both), and work that interferes with or completely disrupts school attendance and schooling in general.” Articles 138 and 182 of ILO’s 1998 Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work state that children should never work under the age of 15 and that they should never be exposed to hazardous working conditions. According to Terre des Hommes, a Swiss NGO that has been defending children’s rights since 1965, “Of all forms of hazardous work, mining is by far the most mortally dangerous sector for children, with an average fatality rate of 32 per 100,000 children between the ages of five and 17.”

The child exploitation in Mica mines is the product of a system that is built on greed and that feeds off people’s desperation and helplessness. A system in which every single action has a consequence, one that connects people around the globe. For consumers to access cosmetics, microwaves or paint for their cars in the United States or Europe, they rely upon a chain of exploitation, misery and modern slavery, which leaves countless victims behind. Companies often overlook their ethical and legal responsibilities in order to engage in cost-effective strategies that will allow them to provide better products at cheaper prices. It is fair to say that with the exception of the children who are exploited in these mines and other hazardous working conditions every single other actor in the supply chain is partly responsible.

According to UNICEF, around 5.7 million children under the age of 18 work on a daily basis in Madagascar, which constitutes around 47 percent of the total amount of the country’s underage population. In 2016, Madagascar overtook India as the world’s largest sheet Mica exporter. Up until that year, an estimated 22,000 children were also exploited in India’s Mica mines, where they faced conditions that crippled their health and development. They suffered from stunted growth, terrible conditions in which the mines could collapse at any moment, and silicosis, a terrible lung disease produced by breathing silica dust. As part of a project created to fight child labour in India, Terre des Hommes implemented a program designed to foster important educational and community networks for children in the region of Jharkhand, where the majority of India’s Mica mines are. They invested numerous resources to build schools, child care centres and empower teachers and community leaders so that they can exercise a positive influence on local families. The program has been successful, as the region has reduced its Mica child labour by more than half, to less than 11,000 children. Perhaps this program can pave the way for the future.

Child labour is clearly unacceptable. It shows a world which in pursuit of wealth and product consumption has become oblivious to, and more important than, the worst kind of human cruelty. Multinationals should ensure that the subsidiaries they work with follow ethical and labour standards. They should do so by establishing better internal audits and by not taking advantage of the lack of regulation that exists in poor and underdeveloped countries. They should never engage with companies that use child labour and avoid doing business in countries that systematically break human rights. Consumers should also make an effort to assess what lies behind the products they acquire. They too are responsible for not acknowledging that there is a life behind every product they buy. They should hold companies accountable for their business practices. Finally, Western countries should include educational programs aimed at fostering critical consumer awareness: not just for the sake of poor and defenceless children, but for that of the entire planet.