06/10/2022, VOA

Vietnam is among the Asian countries mentioned in a The US Department of Labor’s newly released report on labor status forced labor and child labor. The report titled “List of Goods Produced by Child Labor or Forced Labor” released by the International Bureau of Affairs (ILAB) of the US Department of Labor on September 28, refers to the countries accused of using forced labor in many sectors, especially fishing and seafood, including Vietnam.

“The United States has a responsibility to end child labor and forced labor,” said Labor Secretary Marty Walsh in the report. Therefore, after President Joe Biden signed into law the bill Against Forced Labor of Uyghurs (UFLPA), which has developed an action strategy to “ensure U.S. businesses and consumers do not unwittingly support violations of human rights and labor rights”.

In this report of 116-page from ILAB of this year, Vietnam is listed as having occupations where child labor is present, including in the brick production, cashew nuts, coffee, fishing, footwear, furniture, leather, pepper, rice, rubber, sugarcane, tea, textiles, timber, tobacco. Particularly, the textile industry is considered an industry that exists both forced labor and labor child.

“The United States is very interested in two sectors when partnering with Vietnam, the first is freedom of religion, the second is workers’ right” Dr. Nguyen Dinh Thang, Executive Director of the Committee to Boat People SOS (BPSOS) in the United States said to VOA.

Besides workers’ rights, according to Dr. Nguyen Dinh Thang, the situation of forced labor and child labor are the two focuses the United States always “keeps an eye” on, but Vietnam “stumbles on both”.

Referring to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC) conducted a review on the implementation of children’s rights in Vietnam in the middle of last month, Dr. Nguyen Dinh Thang said the committee raised two issues related to child labor in Vietnam.

“Firstly, Vietnamese law defines a minor as 16-year-old as the threshold, while international law and international conventions that Vietnam signed defined as 18-year-old, so 16, 17-year-old, according to the international definition, considered child labor. Thus, the commission (of the United Nations) recommended Vietnam to change the whole law”.

The director of BPSOS said the second issue that CRC raised was Vietnam has no explanation on the “investigation and prosecution of perpetrators ” on child labor.

“Therefore, there is no prevention so the perpetrators are still happy and continue to exploit the labor of the children.”

In addition to Vietnam, some other Asian countries such as Thailand, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Cambodia… are all accused of using child labor, especially in the fishing and seafood processing industry.

Regarding forced labor, even though China is the country “pointed out” in the report of the US Department of Labor (because of the forced action of the Uighur minority in the re-education camps it calls the “vocational training”), Vietnam is also listed as having forced labor in the textile industry.

This year’s report was released by the U.S. Department of Labor “at a very important time,” said Thea Mei Lee, head of international labor affairs at the U.S. Department of Labor, amidst the global supply chain facing a lot of problems. Therefore, ILAB focuses on tracing any signs of child labor and forced labor “at the beginning”, rather than just looking at the products in question, in order to “make people more aware of the entire supply chain”, thereby calling on governments, international organizations and consumers to contribute to preventing and ending this practice at its root.