Working Children in Agriculture in Haiti, Sud Department

ICF International carried out a survey of child work in Haiti for the U.S. Department of Labor
(USDOL) in December 2011. The main population of interest consisted of children ages 5 to 17
who were involved in agriculture. The primary objective of the study was to estimate the
prevalence of children working in agriculture in the Sud Department of Haiti, and to obtain
representative information on the working conditions of these children, with a focus on
workplace hazards.
To collect these data, ICF International conducted a quantitative household survey in the Sud
Department of Haiti. The household survey included interviews with adult informants about the
household and its members, as well as interviews with all the children ages 5 to 17 living in the
household. The sample, which was representative of rural areas in the Sud Department, included
a total of 999 interviews with adult household members and 1,414 interviews with children.
Based on this representative sample, the study estimated that approximately 256,000 people
(ages 5 and older) in the Sud Department of Haiti participated in agriculture for at least 1 hour in
the previous 12 months. Out of these 256,000, approximately 176,000 were active in the
previous 7 days. Based on the household survey, approximately one-fourth of agricultural
workers who had worked in the last 7 days were children. Reports from adults indicated that
nearly half as many children were working compared with child self-reports (44,817 versus
92,442 in the last 7 days). Slightly more of the child workers in agriculture were male than
female (56.2 versus 43.8 percent, respectively, according to child reports). Working children
were older on average than nonworking children (median age of 12 for working children versus
9 for nonworking children).
This study found that approximately half of both working and nonworking children were living
with both parents (48.5 and 51.7 percent, respectively). The marital status of the heads of
household for the two groups were similar and indicated that most (82.7 percent) of the
children’s households were headed by married individuals. Approximately one-fourth of
the children’s heads of household had completed primary school or higher (20.4 percent for
working children and 25.7 percent for nonworking children). A comparison of the indicators of
socioeconomic status explored in this study indicated no difference between the families
of working children and those of nonworking children.
The vast majority (90.9 percent) of surveyed children were attending school at the time of the
survey. Among those not attending school, by far the most commonly cited reason for not doing
so was lack of financial means (72.6 percent). Daily attendance appeared to be high both for
children working in agriculture and those not working in agriculture, with 92.1 percent of all
children reporting attending school every day during the last week school was in session.
However, working in agriculture was associated with poorer school performance. Children
working in agriculture had an average 3.0 age-grade delay compared to 2.0 for nonworking
children. Overall, 7.5 percent of children working in agriculture and attending school reported
that their work interfered with their studies, and 10.8 percent reported having missed school for
work on a weekly basis.