Children hunched up in factories all day long, making carpets or footballs; servants in wealthy homes; kids in bonded labour in brick-kiln industries, working up to 15 hours a day, from the tender age of five. This is the reality of the lives of some 250 million children involved in labour worldwide. Children have, of course, always worked, making an important contribution to family needs. However, in many instances, children have become the main breadwinners, exploited by multinationals that are keen to employ a workforce which is neither organised nor articulate, easily controlled and in no position to quibble over ridiculously low wages.

In an effort to abolish this increasingly dire situation, organisations such as the International Labour Organisation (ILO), at international level, and the Irish Congress of Trade Unions have undertaken several campaigns to raise awareness of the issues surrounding child labour. There have been significant successes - such as English Premiership clubs refusing to sell footballs made by child labour. But there is still a long way to go.

Recently, Congress and Comhlamh organised a public forum, Child Labour - Can it be Abolished? David Joyce, development education officer with Congress, explains: "Our objective here is to protect and promote the rights of children, especially the right to be free from economic exploitation. We have representation at UN level, where work on a new convention on child labour is nearing completion. "Meanwhile, we are working to promote the charter on child labour, which, if it was fully complied with, would abolish the exploitation of children for economic gain."

In Ireland, he says, we have very good legislation on children and work - "but very little monitoring of what is going on. There is no research being undertaken in this area. But anecdotal evidence suggests there is a problem with children having to work on a part-time basis, which adversely effects their education."

According to Joyce, one of the main reasons for child labour internationally is family poverty. "Children working under all sorts of appalling conditions are doing so to supplement the family income. But we need to look to ways which ensure the adults work and the children are educated. It is quite a complex issue and is dependent on effective strategies from the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund."

The use of consumer power would also help. "The rights of workers in the toy industry in general are very poor, but if people don't buy the toys, the workers suffer. It is preferable if consumers exercise their power by writing to companies and urging them to adopt a code of conduct regarding the workplace."

However, the abolition of child labour as a goal isn't as simple as it should be. Dr Angela Veale is a lecturer in applied psychology at University College Cork, where she has been working on programmes in Ethiopia and Rwanda over the past few years.

"In the West we tend to see the issue of child labour in black and white terms," she says. "But abolition is an ideal. The issues surrounding child labour in reality are very complex; they are survival issues in societies where choosing what's best for the child is not the same thing it might be here. The context is completely different. "In some places in the world, choosing to educate your child precipitates sending them to work. The money for their education just doesn't exist, so they have to spend time working on the streets selling things to make that money. "Compounding the problem is the high rate of unemployment, regardless of educational opportunities. Statistics show that a high percentage of young people who have been to school still can't get jobs. In some cases parents see the education system as irrelevant to the needs of the family. They also look at the danger of working on the street in order to pay for school, and in the best interests of their children decide against sending them to school."

Veale says it is important to place the issue in the context of these real choices and to focus on ensuring the labour children often must undertake, given economic conditions, is neither exploitative nor hazardous.

"There is a strong culture of petty trading undertaken by children in Africa. Many work on the street during the day selling products made by their parents - such as peanuts roasted at home by their mothers, which they sell in bars. The parents may also be working, but frequently their work is both erratic and very badly paid. In these circumstances, it is important to look at how to define hazardous employment for children, and how to ensure they don't have to undertake it."

While recognising the complexity of the situation, the ILO policy focuses on the abolition of child labour, regarding childhood as a period of time for education and development, so children can grow up to become healthy, working adults.