June 12th is World Day Against Child Labour

Approximately 218 million children worldwide are involved in child labour. That is about 14% of 5 to 17 year olds globally, or roughly one in seven children. It is simply too many.

To raise awareness of the issue, and to promote schooling as the right alternative, Concern has launched www.tinypickers.com, the website of a fictional company which is being investigated due to their suspected use of child labour.

As Concern’s site explains:

‘Concern's Stop Child Labour campaign wants you to help give children back their childhood and give them the opportunity to go to school.

So next time you pick up a bar of chocolate, a pack of coffee, or a cotton t-shirt, ask your retailer if the product contains traces of child labour.

Because at the end of the day, any product made using child labour, no matter what it looks like or what price it is, will leave a bad taste in your mouth’


It is an innovative campaign, and certainly one very powerful message.

Free Film Screeings- Moving World

(taken from the Irish Film and Television Network website (IFTN)- I saw two shorts last week from the initiative, which were really interesting... )

A series of free film screenings and workshops on the themes of migration and dislocation is taking place in Dublin as part of the Moving Worlds: Cinemas of Migration Film Season from 22nd May – 10th July 2008.

‘Moving Worlds’ is an initiative of FOMACS (Forum on Migration and Communications, DIT) in partnership with Create, the national development agency for collaborative arts, the Instituto Cervantes, Goethe Institut and Austrian Embassy. The film season aims to highlight comparative stories of migration and transcultural film production.

Films set to screen include Robert Rae’s ‘Trouble Sleeping’, on 5th June, which tells the story of a group of refugees, one of whose survival depends on the revelation of a friend’s closely guarded secret. Director Robert Rae will be present at the screening along with Helen Trew, Community Producer, and Ghazi Hussein, scriptwriter, to introduce the film. Rae will conduct a workshop on collaborative filmmaking from on 6th June from 10 am – 12pm.

US directors Shari Robertson and Michael Carnerini’s ‘Well Founded Fear’, a documentary about the American political asylum system, will screen on the 12th June. The directors will host a workshop on the Epidavros Film Project and their forthcoming documentary series, ‘How Democracy Works Now’, on 13th June from 10am-12pm.

Other films to screen include Christian Wagner’s ‘Ghettokids’ (Germany), Nick Broomfield’s ‘Ghost’ (UK ) and Rabah Ameur-Zaime’s ‘Wesh Wesh, qu’est ce qui se passé?’ (France)

Film screenings and workshops will take place in the Goethe Institut, Merrion Square and Instituto Cervantes, Lincoln Place.

To reserve places film screenings or book places for the various workshops, contact series coordinator Dr. Rashmi Sawhney at the Centre for Transcultural Research and Media Practice, Dublin Institute of Technology by e-mail rashmi.sawhney@dit.ie or telephone on 01-4023108.

For a full programme, dates and locations go to www.create-ireland.ie