Five agreements against child labour signed in Morocco

06/03/2007

[File] Lalla Meryem

Morocco's Secretariat of State for Family, Solidarity and Social Action signed five agreements at the weekend in Rabat against the use of girls as domestic help as part of the national Inqad plan, local press reported on Monday (March 5th). Princess Lalla Meryem, chairwoman of the National Foundation for Children’s Rights, chaired the signing ceremony. Reportedly, the signing of the conventions marks the launch of the second stage of the Inqad programme, which aims at curbing the spread of the phenomenon in the regions of Casablanca, Marrakech, Rabat, Fes, Taounate and Errachidia. They provide a series of measures to reach the goals of the ten-year National Action Plan for Youth. Official statistics show that as many as 600,000 underaged Moroccans work in the country, accounting for 11% of the 5.4 million children aged 7 to 14. Some 58% of them are boys, mostly working as street vendors, and the remaining 42% are girls, mainly working as domestic help. (Le Matin, MAP)