The ECLT Foundation has a bold ambition. We are working for rural families so they can benefit from farming while ensuring that their children are healthy, educated, safe from exploitation, and encouraged to reach their full potential. For the over 108 million children in child labour in agriculture, including tobacco growing, this is a huge undertaking. By building strong partnerships with communities, governments, businesses and donors, we believe real change is possible.
In 2017, we responded to the large number of challenges faced by rural communities where tobacco is grown.
David Hammond, ECLT's Executive Director, said, "As you will see from this year’s report, ECLT’s work in 2017 alone reached over 37,000 children, farmers and families in rural communities where tobacco is grown, but the impact goes much further. By getting the right stakeholders to the table, including governments, agrobusinesses, unions, and civil society experts, ECLT supports concrete commitments aligned with established international human rights frameworks, which translate to sustainable actions to improve the lives of the children to whom we are ultimately accountable. The stakes for families living in poverty and children in situations of child labour are extremely high and so there is no room for complacency, or a reduction in pace and effort to continue to fulfil our mandate.
Looking ahead, the ECLT Foundation will continue to prioritise transparent collaboration with an open-door policy of engagement and best practice sharing to multiply our impact and accelerate sustainable change for children, who remain at the heart of all of our work."