Rug Making Child Labor

Rug m ark the society is promoting rugmark carpets hand woven carpets which carry a guarantee against the use of child labor in preference to carpets made by children some as young as four years of age.

Rug making child labor. Most rug producing countries including iran turkey turkmenistan uzbekistan egypt and others have outlawed child labor. Even well known american producers are split on child labor. Goodweave international formerly known as rugmark is a network of non profit organizations dedicated to ending illegal child labour in the rug making industry. Rugmark is now known as goodweave.

One of the enduring myths of the rug business is that fine rugs are made by children because only they have the little fingers that can tie such tiny knots in fact precisely the opposite is true. Rugmark was established in 1995 as the international label against illegal child labor in the rug industry. The report tainted carpets. Sadly pakistan and india still allow child labor and even worse child slave labor.

This organization works to end forced labor and has helped reduce its incidence by 80 in the south asian rug industry. According to the us department of labor child labor is rare in most oriental rugs but all too common in pakistani and indian rugs. The lowest quality cheapest labor is child labor because children are so unskilled and inexperienced at the craft. Slavery and child labor in india s hand made carpet sector documents over 3 200 cases across nine states in india and found several hundred cases each of forced.