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NATIONAL, HEADLINE

Child Street Vendors on the rise, PN urges Govt to take urgent measures

Child Street Vendors on the rise, PN urges Govt to take urgent measures

Image Tatoli/António Daciparu

DILI, 13 december 2025 (TATOLI) – The National Parliament has expressed its concern about the rise of child street vendors in Timor-Leste, urging the government to take serious actions to put an end to child laborers in Timor-Leste.

MP Cedelízia Faria dos Santos from CNRT said that she had directly observed a number of areas in Dili known for child street vendors.

“As you can see in front of Timor Plaza, the number of child street vendors has continued to increase recently,” Santos made the comment during the plenary session, on monday.

She said that child street vendors continue to increase, especially during Christmas and New Year’s Eve, selling children’s Christmas lamps.

In addition, many children now sell meatballs and ice cream on the streets, especially those from Oe-Cusse.

In order to leave no child behind, Santos reiterated that the government must take necessary measures to end child labor in the country.

Santos questioned the work of the Institute for the Defense of Children’s Rights (INDICA) in the country.

“The Ministry of Social Solidarity and Inclusion (MSSI-Tetun) must take serious measures to solve the child laborers in the country. Because we have established INDDICA but we don’t really know its work, so MSSI must take on the role of ending child labor,” she stressed.

The Deputy Minister for Parliamentary Affairs, Adérito Hugo da Costa, said that he would present the matter to MSSI.

TATOLI’s crew observed that the children sell various goods to earn some money, from meatball vendors on street corners to young boys selling boiled eggs and snacks to pedestrians in Dili.

Last year, Timor-Leste, with support from the ILO, moved forward with the efforts to finalize two important documents for the elimination of child labor in the country: The National Action Plan on Child Labour and the List of Hazardous Works for Children.

The 2016 joint study by the Government of Timor-Leste and the ILO revealed that approximately 67,000 children aged 5 to 17 were economically active, of whom 52,000 were child laborers with 29,000 involved in hazardous works.

According to a report issued jointly by ILO and UNICEF in 2023, 160 million children were engaged in child labour as of the beginning of 2020, accounting for almost 1 in 10 of all children worldwide. Among these are children from Timor-Leste. With 10 per cent of children from 5 to 12 years of age classified as being engaged in economic activities, urgent collaborative actions are required to combat this problem, which poses a threat to the country’s key targets for the Sustainable Development Goals, including those related to poverty eradication, education, gender equality and decent work.

The Government’s ratification of the Convention on the Rights of the Child in 2003 was a positive show of commitment to protecting children from abuse and rights violations. Other key international agreements, such as the 1999 Worst Forms of Child Labour Convention, formally known as Convention No. 182, have also been ratified by Timor-Leste, demonstrating the commitment of the Government to take actions to prohibit and eliminate the worst forms of child labour, including slavery, child prostitution, and the use of children in criminal activities and dangerous labour.

 

 

Jornalista: Nelson de Sousa
Editor: Cancio Ximenes
Translator: Jose Belarmino de Sa

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