From Recycling Work to Recycling One's Dignity
Three years ago, more than 470 persons living in the shanty towns
known as Villa 31 and Villa 31 bis, the most populated shantytowns
in Buenos Aires, were subsisting day to day by plowing the streets
in search of cans, cardboard and other discarded items that could
be scraped and resold to recyclers.
More than 120 of these cartoneros or recyclers were minors; 50
per cent of the families were internal migrants and 10 per cent
were external migrants from neighbouring countries. They arrived in
the Argentine capital of Buenos Aires in search of better
opportunities, but what they found was a reality they never
imagined – scratching a living from some else's garbage. Many
were forced to take their children to work with them in order to
collect enough to make a few pesos each day.
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target="" title="">Recuperar: Preventing and Eradicating Child
Labour in Migrant Families
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It was in 2005 that IOM Buenos Aires launched Recuperar or Recycle,
a project aimed at preventing and eradicating child labour amongst
migrant families earning a living through recycling in the city of
Buenos Aires.
The project was designed with three main objectives: to provide
micro credits to the parents, in order for them to create micro
enterprises that would increase the family's income allowing the
children to stop working and attend school; workshops for the
parents to provide information and raise awareness about the rights
of the child, including the right not to work, attend school, and
receive health care; and assistance for the beneficiaries to
regularize their migration status.
The success of the first phase, which assisted 40 families, led
to a second phase in 2009 which assisted 60 families. Of the 230
persons assisted, 170 were minors; 97 per cent of them are now
enrolled in school.
"It hurts me to think that I made my daughter work, looking
inside garbage cans to collect cans," recalls María
Angélica Banzer with tears in her eyes. "The IOM workshop
taught me to value my daughters."
Thirty-nine-year-old Banzer and her husband arrived in Buenos
Aires from Santa Cruz, Bolivia in 1999. Thanks to the support
received from Recuperar she now prepares and sells food. "When I
came here, my idea was to grow and become someone in life; of
getting a job and returning to my country with some money to start
a business there. But things did not work out that way. It was very
sad because I learned what slavery was; I must admit that my fellow
countrymen enslaved me," she explains.
In 2001, due to the economic crisis which battered the country,
María Angélica and her husband decided to return to
Bolivia. Back in her country, she studied and found work as a
kindergarten teacher, but her husband wanted to return to Argentina
to study journalism. "Once back in Buenos Aires, I was unemployed,
so we lived on my husband's earnings. Sometimes I would go out with
my husband and my two daughters to pick up beer cans, which we then
sold for four pesos (US$1.04) per kilo. Sometimes we collected
almost three bags full of tins, and so for each bag we would get 60
pesos (US$15.71)."
Boys and girls working in waste collection activities are not
only stigmatized by their peers, but they are exposed to accidents,
skin infections, abuse, and sometimes the risk of death.
"I learned a lot thanks to Recuperar. I learned that children
are entitled to their space. I learned that I cannot demand so much
from a small child. That I am the responsible one, the strong one,"
says Cecilia Félix, another beneficiary of the IOM
project.
Cecilia was born in Lima, Peru. And although life in her country
"was not so difficult", she says she decided to migrate to
Argentina to earn more money. Her brother, who was already living
in Buenos Aires, convinced her. "I came here and started working so
I could send money home. I did not find work the first month and a
half. I was desperate so I went to an employment agency because, if
I did not send money home, my family could not eat."
Finally, she got a job doing housework. Shortly after that her
husband and four children arrived in Buenos Aires, they could not
find a place to live because no hotel would accept so many
children. "So we came to the shanty town", she recalls. "When the
economic crisis hit Argentina, I started selling odds and ends at
fairs. Sometimes, we took the children, but other times we left
them locked up at home. We noticed that people were picking up
cardboard, so we started to do it too. And then our children as
well, when they came home from school. We collected it little by
little, and then sold it."
Born in Tupiza, Bolivia, 25-year-old Natalia Calla arrived in
Argentina in 2006. She was following her dream to grow and become a
professional. "I have a degree in Technician in Fine Arts. I worked
with art in my hometown. I made paintings and drawings, on garments
and on traditional handicrafts in my country. I came to Argentina
because I wanted to stand out as an artist," Natalia explains.
"In Bolivia, I worked as a professor and did well. When I came
here, I started recycling garbage, something many people do, but
for a while I was ashamed of myself, but on the other hand I knew
it was my only source of income," Natalia adds.
Besides the micro-credit which allowed her to buy an industrial
sewing machine, the Recuperar project helped Natalia to regularize
her migration status in Argentina.
The project assisted all beneficiaries to regularize their
status. And for those who had a temporary or permanent residence
permit, Recuperar helped them obtain the National Identity
Card.
"Now that I have papers, I feel I have more rights. Before I
felt I could not enjoy any rights in this country," says
María Angélica.
And she adds with a big smile, "I was a bit shy before, but the
workshops organized by IOM have helped me to become more
self-confident. Now I have many friends, I like sharing and I want
to go on like this. I love it and I am thankful for all their
help."
IOM provided funding for the first phase of the project. The
second phase was financed by the Inter-American Development Bank
(IDB) through the Japan Special Fund, and by the Cooperación
Andina de Fomento or Andean Development Corporation and the Peery
Foundation.