11 Jun 2009

DR CONGO / CHILD LABOR

In the Democratic Republic of Congo, children work with family members crushing rocks into gravel in the mine dumps. The town of Kipushi, once thriving with private mining companies, is now suffering from the dramatic fall in the price of minerals caused by the global financial crisis. (World Day Against Child Labour is Friday, 12 June 2009) UNICEF

Posted at: June 11, 2009 5:54 pm

Duration: 01:54

Available in: SD

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Full script

STORY: DRC / CHILD LABOR
TRT: 1.54
SOURCE: UNICEF
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: FRENCH / NATS

DATELINE: 10-12 MARCH 2009, KIPUSHI, DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO

SHOTLIST:

1. Wide shot, mine towers
2. Pan, mine dump
3. Wide shot, boy and mother crushing rocks
4. Close up, foot
5. Close up, crushing rocks
6. Close up, mother and son
7. Pan right, rock crushers
8. Close up, boy crushing rock
9. Various shots, rock crushers
10. Pan right, tower to dump
11. SOUNDBITE (French) Bichi Banza, mother, 40:
"When one doesn't eat, when one doesn't even have the possibility to eat, when one doesn't have the possibility to pay school fees for the children? No this is why you see us here with our children."
12. Wide shot, women and abandoned gear
13. Med shot, two boys
14. Close up, little boy
15. SOUNDBITE (French) Bichi Banza, mother, 40:
"This is a mining town. It says so in all the papers and in all the documents.  If the mine stops, the town stops."
16. Zoom out, school kids
17. Med shot, teacher
18. Pan right, class
19. Med shot, schoolboy
20. Various shots, girl washing her hair 
21. SOUNDBITE (French) Vanessa, 12:
"I saw my friends going to school and it hurt a lot.  I kept looking for ways to go to school.  Thankfully Group One came along and took me off the quarry and sent me to school."
22. Med shot, Vanessa walking 
23. Zoom out, girl walking up hill

STORYLINE:

Perched between piles of rubble and rocks, two-year-old Sylvian pounds rocks with a makeshift mallet.

This is all he has known during his short life. Twelve-hour days beginning at five in the morning and ending at dusk, the constant sound of pounding rocks serving as the time keeper.

SOUND UP

Every day Sylvain and his mother come to the ore dumps in the southern Congolese town of Kipushi to pound the larger rocks into gravel. The finished piles sell for 30,000 francs and are used in building construction.

For mothers like forty-year-old Bichi Banza, who has six children, the occasional sale of a pile of gravel will hopefully keep her children fed, but rarely is it enough to pay the monthly cost of school.

SOUNDBITE (French) Bichi Banza, mother, 40:
"When one doesn't eat, when one doesn't even have the possibility to eat, when one doesn't have the possibility to pay school fees for the children? No this is why you see us here with our children."

In the last few years, private mining investment led to new jobs and  opportunities in Congo's resource rich Katanga province. But a dramatic fall in the price of minerals caused by the global financial crisis has hit Kipushi and other mining towns hard.

Many mines have shut down, those that haven't, have scaled down operations. Thousands of jobs have been lost. Many have turned to crushing rocks to survive.

SOUNDBITE (French) Bichi Banza, mother, 40:

"This is a mining town. It says so in all the papers and in all the documents.  If the mine stops, the town stops."

And when the town stops, families don't work, children don't eat or go to school.

The convention on the rights of the child says that children have the right to be protected from economic exploitation.

Group One, a UNICEF supported Belgian NGO, is seeking to remove children, like twelve-year old Vanessa from the hazardous working conditions of the quarry and get them back to school.

She spent her days with her mother at the ore dump. Her father, a welder, lost his job six years ago and she was forced to drop out of school and work full time crushing rocks.

SOUNDBITE (French) Vanessa, 12:
"I saw my friends going to school and it hurt a lot.  I kept looking for ways to go to school.  Thankfully Group One came along and took me off the quarry and sent me to school."

The return to school has been accompanied by a safety net of financial support to her family to compensate for the lack of income.

Through education and an economic independence from the mines, towns like Kipushi might survive, and those who have only ever known life in the dumps, might have a better chance.

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