Child Labor in Catarman Northern Samar Parents’ Knowledge and Perceived Effectiveness of Print Materials

Abstract

Child labor remains a serious problem in many parts of the world. Many of the children involved live in underdeveloped countries. In Catarman, the capital town of Northern Samar, this social dilemma holds true. The economic state of the province as one of the poorest provinces of the country has great impact on the most vulnerable sectors of the province’s populace, particularly the children. In fact, the Child Labor Committee of the municipality validated the existence of the following forms of child labor in the province: domestic helping; stevedoring; PD cab driving; farming; KTV or bar waiting; and vending. Non-government offices like United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) and Plan Philippines intervene to strengthen and implement appropriate measures to eradicate forms of child labor. This paper determined the parents’ knowledge level about Catarman child labor and evaluated the effectiveness of the print materials used by the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) and Plan Philippines in campaigning against child labor as perceived by the parents. A mix of quantitative (survey) and qualitative (key informant) was used in generating data on the perceptions of parents and their sources of information. As to the perceived effectiveness of the print materials, the following themes were used: attractiveness; comprehension, self- involvement and persuasion. A thematic analysis on the transcribed key informants interviews was employed for the qualitative part.