Business Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Sunday, Jul 16, 2006
Business Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Sunday, Jul 16, 2006 |
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Industry & Economy
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Employment Agri-Biz & Commodities - Trends Rural child workers earn more in agriculture Ambarish Mukherjee
Key findings Cane crushing is the highest paid occupation. Harvesting is more remunerative for women. Well-digging is the attractive option for adult workers.
New Delhi , July 15 For those unfortunate children in rural India, whose parents cannot afford to get them educated, it seems to be more remunerative to crush canes or get involved in occupations such as sowing or transplanting than to work as cow herds or the other un-skilled non agricultural activities. According to the latest Rural Labour Employment Data released recently by the Labour Bureau under the Ministry of Labour and Employment, children working in agricultural operations in rural India earn substantially more than those employed in non-agricultural occupations in these areas during fiscal 2004-05.
High and low
The data shows that cane crushing is the highest paid occupation for child labourers engaged in agricultural occupations earning in the range of Rs 38.89 to Rs 43.26 per day during fiscal 2004-05 followed by sowing and transplanting occupations. On the other hand, the average daily earning of an unskilled child labourer in rural India engaged in non-agricultural occupation was Rs 29.51 during that year. Managing animal herds appears to be the lowest paid occupation in rural India where a child labourer gets an average daily payment of only Rs 27.58. The report covered 11 agricultural occupations and seven non-agricultural occupations entailing manual work from a fixed set of 600 sample villages spread over 20 States since July 1986 for each agricultural year. The report also provides data on the working and living conditions of agriculture and rural labourers. Among the adult workers, well digging has been identified as the highest paid activity for men engaged in agricultural occupations followed by ploughing and sowing. During 2004-05, the all India average daily wage in well-digging varied from Rs 80.65 in May 2005 to Rs 90.62 in July 2004. The survey also pointed out that well-diggers were paid the highest in Kerala and the lowest in Madhya Pradesh.
Harvesting for women
For the women folk, harvesting fetched the maximum wage followed by transplanting and well-digging. The all-India average daily wage rate for women engaged in harvesting ranged between Rs 48.67 in November 2004 and Rs 53.66 in June 2005. Herds-keeping turned out to be the least remunerative occupation for all categories of workers. The annual average daily wage rates for men and women in this occupation were as low as Rs 41.51 and Rs 31.68, respectively. Incidentally, the data also reveals that no female worker was found in four occupations, namely, carpenters, blacksmiths, cobblers and tractor drivers during the year 2004-05.
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