Observation (CEACR) - adopted 2016, published 106th ILC session (2017)

Worst Forms of Child Labour Convention, 1999 (No. 182) - Oman (Ratification: 2001)

Article 4(1). Determination of hazardous types of work. In its previous comments, the Committee noted that the Ministry of Manpower had drafted, in collaboration with the social partners and other competent bodies, a list of hazardous types of work prohibited for persons under the age of 18.

The Committee notes that, Ministerial Order No. 217/2016, which is attached to the Government’s report, specifies the list of tasks and occupations in which the employment of children is allowed, which involves mostly the occupation as a salesperson. However, the Committee notes with regret that the Government does not appear to have adopted a list of hazardous types of work. The Committee further notes that the Children’s Act was promulgated on 19 May 2014. Its section 45 prohibits the employment of any child in occupations or industries which, by their very nature or due to the conditions in which they are practised, are likely to be harmful to the child’s health, safety or moral conduct, and provides that these occupations and industries shall be specified by the Minister of Manpower after consultation with the bodies concerned. According to the Government’s reply to question 17 of the list of issues in relation to the combined third and fourth periodic reports to the Committee on the Rights of the Child of 30 December 2015 (CRC/C/OMN/Q/3-4/Add.1), the Ministry of Manpower and the bodies concerned are conducting a final review of a draft ministerial decision regulating the terms and conditions under which young persons can be employed and specifying the occupations, trades and industries in which their employment is not allowed, due to the bodily, psychological, moral, chemical, physical or biological risks involved. Noting that the Government has been referring to the pending adoption of this list since 2007, the Committee once again strongly urges the Government to take the necessary measures to ensure a list determining the types of hazardous work prohibited to persons under the age of 18 is adopted as a matter of urgency. It requests the Government to provide a copy of this list, once adopted.