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Ghana on Thursday joined the rest of the world to mark the 2014 World Day Against Child Labour. The Day, which was on the theme: �Combating Child Labour in Ghana through Effective Social Protection�, was marked with a National Stakeholder Policy Forum, and the launch of a report on Ghana�s Peer Review on Child Labour. Ghana in 2013 availed herself to be peer reviewed by selected ECOWAS-Member States after a self-assessment has been completed by the Child Labour Unit of the Ministry. The report revealed child labour as a huge problem in Ghana across all sectors, particularly the agricultural and domestic sectors where most children were found to be working under dehumanising conditions, and suggestion were made as to how to confront such challenges and solve them. Mr Antwi-Boasiako Sekyere Deputy Minister of Employment and Labour Relations who launched the report, said despite progress made over the years, the 2016 target set by the international community for the elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labour, as priority within the global light for the eradication of all child labour, would not be met. Mr Sekyere said there was the need to accelerate and intensify efforts by protecting children and their families through social intervention programmes to give them equal opportunities to fulfill their potentials and live healthy and happy and productive lives. The theme therefore draws the attention of government and stakeholders, to the significance of social protection in keeping children out of labour and ensures that they develop and realise their full potentials. According to Mr Antwi-Boasiako Sekyere, events like this highlight not only the plight of child labour victims, especially those in the worst forms, but also the existing policy interventions and programmes against child labour. �Furthermore, they stimulate the commitment of all partners to put in place other measures to eradicate the canker�, as children constitute the potential human resource base of every nation and therefore it was imperative to protect and preserve them for the future, he said. He said government has over the years taken serious steps put in place policies and social protection interventions such as the National School Feeding Programme, National Health Insurance Scheme, Free Compulsory and Universal Basic Education and the Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty among others to improve the welfare of children and their families. According to him, the latest International Labour Organisation Global Labour Estimates, released in September, 2013, showed a slight decline in the number of child labourers by one- third since 2000, reducing from 246 million to 168 million, while the number of children in hazardous work also went down from 171 million to 85 million within the same period. He said Government is committed to implement the recommendations of the report, which include the enforcement of the legal and policy framework, enhancing the capacity of the Child Labour Unit, improving financial resourcing for child labour intervention and mainstreaming of child labour into development programmes to accelerate the pace of elimination of child labour in Ghana. Nana Oye Lithur, Minister of Gender, Children and Social Protection, called for stronger partnership and collaboration among stakeholders as a sure way of achieving a meaningful headway in the fight against the elimination of child labour in Ghana. She affirmed the political will of government to work towards the achievement of a well coordinated National Policy to regulate the activities of all institutions and harmonise existing programmes on child labour in the country to ensure proper implementation and enforcement.