According to a recent report published by the Abring Foundation, a Brazilian charity campaigning for the rights of children and adolescents, more than 3 million underage children in Brazil are involved in child labour.
According to the report, titled “Childhood and Adolescence Overview – 2016”, 44% of children in Brazil live in poverty, and 17% in extreme poverty.
Another 188,000 are undernourished; about 69,000 are underweight; and half a million are obese. 19% of homicides in Brazil are committed against children and adolescents, and 80% of these involve the use of firearms.
Out of 61 million children, only 25% between the age of zero and three attend kindergarten, and 19% of young children have a teenage mother.
While the school participation rate in Brazil is high at about 96%, only 56% of children finish school.
Article 7 of the Brazilian Constitution prohibits night work and dangerous or unhealthy work for children under 18, as well as any other type of work for children under 16; except for apprenticeships, which are permitted from age 14.