British American Tobacco Vows to Investigate Child Workers in Bangladeshi Farms

Reuters, 30/06 16:55 CET

By Nita Bhalla

NEW DELHI (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – British American Tobacco (BAT), the world’s second biggest cigarette company, vowed on Thursday to investigate some of its supply farms in Bangladesh after a Swedish campaign group uncovered the use of child workers to grow and process tobacco.

Swedwatch, which surveyed three tobacco farming districts in Bangladesh, said it found child labor was “widespread” in farms supplying BAT and its local subsidiary British American Tobacco Bangladesh, jeopardising their health and education.

“Girls and boys of all ages are responsible for irrigating and leveling the field. Some of them carry loads as well and bring seedlings from the bed to the field,” said the study, which was conducted between July 2015 and May 2016.

“After harvesting, they break the leaves, cut the stems, and help to monitor the kiln temperature while curing.”

Swedwatch said children were not only pulled out of school to work for up to 16 hours a day during the harvest season but were also engaged in tasks that exposed them to green tobacco plants, dust from tobacco and smoke from kiln drying.

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Source: euronews.