Child labour

Child Labour

The chances are at least one item of clothing you are wearing right now has been made by a small child working long days to earn whatever money they can to support their families. in 2008 it was estimated that around 153 million children aged 5-14 were a part of the child labour industry, excluding all those that only do light work.  
Nike, the world wide producer of sportswear and footwear and with a revenue of 24,128,000, has factories all over the world. There have been many allegations of Nike using child labour and sweatshops to produce their products in countries where the governments have less power over international businesses such as China, Mexico and Vietnam.
Whilst Nike is not directly employing these children, the companies they are subcontracting to create the products are. The children are working in horrible conditions, being beaten and abused for very little pay. The issue of Nike using child labour has been a big issue for activists for about 20 years now but has anything really changed?

For further reading see the links below;
http://www1.american.edu/ted/nike.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nike_sweatshops