Research that implies that economic sanctions on countries that use child labor may make the situation worse. It’s just the old sanctions dilemma, in a new form. Sanctions wreck economies, something that will always hurt the poor more than the elites who run the country. In this case, since child labor is the resource of last resort, increased rice prices that come from international trade let families end child labor. Food for thought, but nothing we didn’t already know.

This is especially unrelated to Central Asia, I admit, because the only real use of child labor here is for harvesting cotton, which is seasonal and requires everyone, not just children.