Child labour in hazelnut plants in the province of Giresun

Child labor is considered to be one of the "the worst forms of child labor" in agricultural sector. Hazelnut farming, in terms of circumstances, negatively affects the children's physical and mental development, because of the facts that it's harvested in summer, it demands long hours of work, it causes exposure to agricultural chemicals, accidents at work and bug / snake insert. The aim of this study is to reveal the working, socio- economic conditions and the educational status of the workers under eighteen years old who work in hazelnut industry in Giresun province. The main material of this study includes seasonal local agricultural workers living in this study area and seasonal migratory agricultural workers staying temporally for agricultural work were evaluated within the scope of the research in Giresun province hazelnut farms. The number of samples which represents the research universe has been determined snowball sampling method. Thus half of the 104 child workers interviewed by face-to-face survey method in 2015 are seasonal migratory agricultural workers while the other half is seasonal local agricultural workers. Also 58 of the interviewed children's families and 47 of the employers were surveyed. Original data which are obtained from the questionnaires analyzed as comparative case study with descriptive statistical methods using SPSS 20.00 software programme. According to the research data, children who work in hazelnut farms mean age is found 14,8 years. Children work 9,24 hours per day under improper conditions. According to the research results, the most important factor of the children labor is the low socio-economic level of their families. The annual average income of the households for seasonal migratory agricultural workers was found as 16,334.47 TRY and 17,560.85 TRY for seasonal local agricultural workers. More than half of the employers (68%) do not consider the age limit for recruitment. The recruitment criterion for employers is that workers can work. When the international legal arrangements in which Turkey is involved in the prevention and removal of child labor and the national legal arrangements in our country are implemented effectively, this problem will be solved mostly.. Therefore, efficient audit should implement on rules about legislations and deterrent sanctions should also imply if the rules are not obeyed.