ILO's Flagship Programmes
International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour and Forced Labour (IPEC+)
Today, there are 152 million children in child labour, and 40 million women, men and children in modern slavery, including 24.9 million in forced labour and 15.4 million in forced marriage. The IPEC+ Flagship provides ILO leadership in global efforts to eliminate these persistent global challenges that violate fundamental human rights.
The IPEC+ Flagship is built on the foundations of the ILO’s Fundamental Principles and Rights At Work and their corresponding international instruments dealing with child labour (Minimum age Convention C138 and Convention on Worst Forms of Child Labour C182) and forced labour (Forced Labour Convention C29, Abolition of Forced Labour Convention C105 and the new Forced Labour Protocol P29). These instruments together provide members with the necessary framework to understand and fight against these two types of human right violations. Simply by virtue of membership, all ILO members are called upon to respect, promote and realize, in good faith, the rights contained in these instruments, regardless of their ratification status.
The IPEC+ Flagship is developing cutting edge tools and policy prescriptions to eliminate all forms of child labour by 2025 and to dismantle systems of forced labour and human trafficking by 2030, thus making possible one vital element of the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda, adopted by the United Nations in 2015.