call for debate on child migration

child migration (women and children)
November 4,2007

Call for national debate on child migration
Story : Doreen Allotey
Three researchers of the University of Ghana, Legon, have called for a national debate on independent child migration, particularly from the North to Southern Ghana, as a basis for formulating policies and programmes that would mitigate the risks associated with it while increasing its benefits.
They say that this could be achieved, “when as a nation, we place the phenomenon of north-south child migration as one of the priority areas on our national human development agenda against the background that the North lags behind in development”.
The call for the debate was part of recommendations made by the researchers, Dr Stephen O. Kwankye, Professor John K. Anarfi and Ms Cynthia Addoquaye Tagoe, following findings of their survey into the “Independent North-South Child Migration in Ghana: The Decision Making process”.
The recommendations were disseminated at the inaugural meeting and launch of the Development Research Centre on Migration, Globalisation and poverty Research Dissemination Network at the Institute of Statistical Social and Economic Research in the University of Ghana, Legon.
The study was conducted in 2005 in Accra and Kumasi and in 2006 supplementary qualitative data from Accra was added.
The aim was to among others find out factors that affect the migration of children from Northern to southern Ghana and who the main players in the decision making process are. The sample size was 450 child migrants at the lorry parks and markets.
The researchers also recommend that the Ministry of Women and Children’s Affairs( MOWAC) institutes a programme that would assist child migrants to the south, who have regretted their movement, to return home and settle them in some business.
This , they said, should be after the children have been equipped with some skills to enable them have relatively more lucrative jobs, especially in the area of self employment.
This programme, they said, should be done in collaboration with civil society organisations which were already into that kind of programmes to achieve a more sustainable integration into the local economy of the children.
The survey found that parents were actively involved in the decision -making process concerning the children’s migration.
The recommendation therefore is that parents should be sensitised on the costs of child migration.
The researchers also suggest that the Government targets the three northern regions as a special case in its poverty reduction programme.
“ From the analysis, some of the young girls engaged in the sheanut trade to secure their transport fare to embark on migration down south. It is therefore possible that if this trade were given a special business attention as one of the Presidential Special Initiatives, it would be a more lucrative source of income for the young girls such that they could stay behind at their places of origin and work in the sheanut and shea butter industry.
In another study into the costs and benefits of children’s independent migration from north to south Ghana, Prof Anarfi and Dr Kwankye found that some of the child migrants were able to make remittances to their family and that migrants working in Kumasi were able to send more remittances than those in Accra.
They found that girls who were able to return home with certain items became “ hot cakes” for suitors.
On the other hand , the risks of child migration they, found included rape, the contraction of Sexually transmitted Infections and trauma.