[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 54 (Wednesday, April 24, 1996)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4005-S4006]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                CHILD LABOR--NOT WITH THE RUGMARK LABEL

  Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, a year ago this month, a young child 
labor activist, Iqbal Masih, was killed in his village in Pakistan. In 
1994, when Iqbal traveled to the United States to receive the Reebok 
Human Rights Award, he also met with the students at Broad Meadows 
Middle School in Quincy, MA. After Iqbal's death, the students at Broad 
Meadows decided to honor his memory by building a school in Iqbal's 
village.
  Earlier this month, the students announced that they have raised 
$100,000 for a school which will be built by Sudhaar, a nongovernmental 
organization in Pakistan. Their dedication and commitment to Iqbal's 
dream assure that he will live on in the hearts and minds of all those 
who will have a better chance in life because of the school they are 
building. Armed with the advantages of education, these children in 
Pakistan will be able to improve their own lives and the lives of their 
families, their communities, their country, and even our common planet.
  Last November, one of the recipients of the Robert F. Kennedy Human 
Rights Award was Kailash Satyarthi, head of the South Asian Coalition 
on Child Servitude, an independent non-governmental organization 
dedicated to the eradication of child labor and bonded labor in the 
carpet industry.
  Mr. Satyarthi and his colleagues have established what is known as 
the Rugmark label, to identify carpets which have not been made with 
child labor. They are urging consumers to purchase only carpets which 
carry the label.
  Mr. President, on the anniversary of Iqbal's death, Albert Shanker, 
president of the American Federation of Teachers, has urged all 
Americans to honor the Rugmark label. I ask unanimous consent that Mr. 
Shanker's appeal be printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                [From the New York Times, Apr. 14, 1996]

                              Knotted Rugs

                           (By Alert Shanker)

       The murder of Iqbal Masih, a year ago this week, forced 
     many Americans to look at a problem they would have preferred 
     to avoid: child labor in developing countries. Iqbal was a 
     world-famous human rights activist. He was also a young 
     Pakistani boy whose mother had sold him to a rug maker when 
     he was four. Iqbal eventually freed himself, and by the time 
     he was murdered, at the age of twelve, he had helped free 
     3,000 other bonded child laborers. That is probably why he 
     was murdered. But many millions of children in Pakistan, 
     India, and other developing nations continue to work as gem 
     stone polishers, glass blowers, and makers of matches, 
     fireworks, clothing and hand-knotted rugs, often conditions 
     that are unspeakable.
       Children who knot rugs are crowded into filthy, poorly lit 
     shops that have minimal ventilation for as many as 16 hours a 
     day, 7 days a week. They are often chained to their looms, 
     and they risk being beaten or even killed if they try to 
     escape. Many die anyway because of horrible conditions under 
     which they work. Manufacturers consider young children to be 
     desirable ``employees'' because they work hard and put up 
     with pay and conditions that adults would not tolerate. The 
     children receive no more than a couple of cents a day for 
     their work; many get nothing.
       A number of developing nations--India and Nepal, for 
     example--have laws on the books banning child labor. 
     Nevertheless, you hear some people using hard-nosed economic 
     arguments to justify exploitation of children. They say that 
     if child labor is what it takes to bolster the economy in a 
     developing country, that's the price the country has to pay. 
     And it's really nobody else's business anyway. But many of 
     these countries also have very high unemployment among 
     adults. Why shouldn't companies hire adults so that parents 
     can support their children instead of having to sell them 
     into bondage?
       However, we don't have to wait for the companies making 
     hand-knotted rugs to get religion (or for countries that are 
     dragging their feet to start enforcing their child labor 
     laws). These rugs are an important export item, and people 
     who buy them can have a big say about the conditions under 
     which they are made. The traditional weapon used by people 
     who want to protest economic injustice is the boycott: Don't 
     buy the product. But a boycott only punishes, and it often 
     punishes those who act responsibly as well as those who 
     don't.
       An Indian child advocate named Kailash Satvarthi had a 
     better idea. He established a nonprofit foundation that 
     allows consumers to identify and buy hand-knotted rugs that 
     are not made with child labor. Rugmark, as the foundation is 
     called, inspects companies that apply for certification and 
     vouches for the fact that they are not using child labor to 
     make their hand-knotted rugs. Inspectors also pay surprise 
     visits to Rugmark-certified companies to make sure they 
     continue to abide by their commitment to use adult

[[Page S4006]]

     labor only. Consumers can recognize Rugmark rugs by a label 
     that only they will carry.
       Rugmark, which is now two years old, has signed up and 
     certified 15 percent of the companies producing hand-knotted 
     rugs in India. A number of others are moving toward 
     certification, but the process is complicated and many carpet 
     makers are understandably hostile to the idea of losing a 
     cheap, excellent, and plentiful supply of labor. So far, the 
     total production of Rugmark rugs has gone to Germany, where 
     the country's largest mail order firm and several large 
     department stores have agreed to carry them. But Rugmark has 
     recently opened up shop in Nepal, with the support of 70 
     percent of the carpet manufacturers there. These rugs will 
     soon be available for import to the U.S. It's up to American 
     consumers to start talking to stores and catalog companies 
     that carry hand-knotted rugs. They should let the businesses 
     know that they do not want rugs made by children, and they 
     should urge them to put pressure on the importers they deal 
     with.
       This coming week, the first Rugmark-certified rugs imported 
     to the U.S. will be auctioned off at a ceremony commemorating 
     the anniversary of Iqbal Masih's death last year. If American 
     consumers do their part, these rugs should be the first of 
     many.

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