Every child and young person should recognise that their life is valuable. To achieve this, we must create structures that guarantee and implement the protection of the most vulnerable.
Initiative
Exploitation, violence and abduction are among the worst forms of child labour and rob children of any chance to develop healthily and freely. In Ghana, 78 per cent of working children are employed in agriculture, including fishing, cocoa and palm oil production. The key in the fight against exploitative child labour is to strengthen legal systems so that existing laws are enforced and children are protected from exploitation.
Impact 2023
Liberation of more than 100 children and youth from bonded labour and exploitation
As a social worker in England, Anita has always been committed to helping disadvantaged people. However, she found it difficult to reconcile her comparatively privileged life in the UK with the poverty and hardship suffered by many people in her home country of Ghana. Anita felt a growing urge to do something tangible to improve the situation in her home country. Finally, she saw a report about the exploitation of children at the Volta Dam in Ghana. Children were forced to work in the fishing industry under life-threatening conditions. Anita could no longer tolerate this suffering.
As a result, she left her secure job in England in 2015 and returned to Ghana. There she joined the human rights organisation International Justice Mission (IJM). IJM frees children in Ghana and around the world from exploitation and slavery and works with the judiciary to effectively prosecute human traffickers and accomplices. Since 2016, Anita has been responsible for leading multidisciplinary teams of investigators, aftercare workers and lawyers for IJM in Ghana.
Together with Anita and IJM, we are fighting for a just world without exploitation and slavery.
Vision
End exploitation and child slavery in Ghana for good.
Programme & Activities
For almost ten years, IJM has been working in close partnership with the Ghanaian government and authorities to strengthen the national legal system and improve the prosecution of cases of exploitative child labour.
Through intensive training, more than 2,200 members of law enforcement agencies and social services have been trained in investigation methods and victim support. In addition, an elite maritime police unit has been set up specifically for inspections on the Volta reservoir – an important measure to bring perpetrators to justice and prevent the exploitation of children in the long term.
At the same time, IJM supports the professional aftercare and reintegration of affected children into their families in order to give them back a piece of their childhood and lay the foundations for a self-determined life.
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