Call for Proposals – Implementation Agreement for the Prevention and Elimination of Child Labour in Agriculture in the Two Governorates of Akkar and Bekaa

Child labour in agriculture remains a critical global issue, with nearly 60% of working children aged 5–17 engaged in agricultural work. This amounts to over 98 million girls and boys worldwide—This reality persists despite agriculture being one of the three most hazardous sectors in terms of work-related fatalities, non-fatal accidents, and occupational diseases.

In Lebanon, child labour in agriculture has gained increasing significance over the past 14 years, particularly following the influx of Syrian refugees, many of whom have settled in rural areas with the sector becoming the primary employment sector for Syrian refugees. Since 2011, Lebanon’s compounded crises, exacerbated by the refugee crisis and economic and financial collapse, have driven vulnerable families to adopt negative coping mechanisms to secure income and meet basic needs. As a result, many children—across Syrian refugee and Lebanese host communities—have been forced to leave school and engage in child labour, including its worst forms, leaving them highly vulnerable to exploitation and harm. This situation has been further aggravated by the education sector’s limited capacity to respond to the needs of Syrian refugee children. Challenges such as overcrowded classrooms, deteriorating school infrastructure, and additional barriers linked to the second-shift system have significantly hindered access to quality and inclusive education.

According to a 2016 Baseline Survey conducted by UNICEF and the Lebanese Ministry of Social Affairs, 6.7% of Syrian children in Lebanon were engaged in child labour, while the number of working Lebanese children had tripled between 2009 and 2016, reaching 6%. Although reliable data on child labour in Agriculture remain scarce, evidence suggests that agricultural work is particularly prevalent in regions such as Akkar, Hermel, and Baalbek, where farm labour is heavily dependent on low-cost, informal, and foreign labour. The informal and unregulated nature of the agricultural sector and its demand for cheap, low-skilled labour have significantly contributed to the increase in child labour, particularly since 2008.

The Reality of Child Labour in Agriculture

Child labour in agriculture is often invisible, as many children in rural areas work on family farms, assisting their parents in agricultural activities. However, even when framed as "helping hands," children often perform the same tasks as adults, including hazardous activities that put their health and safety at risk.

Several key factors contribute to the persistence of child labour in Lebanon’s agricultural sector:

• The nature of the agriculture sector:  The Agriculture sector remains largely informal and unregulated with an ILO assessment conducted in 2021 showing that 95.3 per cent of agricultural workers in Lebanon were employed informally. The sector falls outside the scope of the labour code, meaning that labour rights, including minimum wage, working hours, social security, and occupational safety, do not formally apply to agricultural workers.  It is also marked by limited labour inspection capacity in rural areas, which enables widespread child labour.
• Socio-economic vulnerabilities and lack of social protection: Lebanon’s worsening socioeconomic crisis has heightened vulnerabilities, leaving both refugee and host communities with limited access to basic needs and social protection mechanisms. Additionally, and as a result to the limited access to formal work for parents and vocational opportunities for Syrian adolescents, many households resort to child labour as a financial survival strategy to provide the essential household needs.
• Barriers to education: Many children in rural areas have limited or no access to quality education, increasing their likelihood of engaging in child labour. Syrian refugee children, in particular, struggle with displacement-related challenges, including socioeconomic hardships, gaps in the education system, and difficulties associated with attending second-shift schools.
• Agricultural constraints: Outdated technology, restricted market access, low productivity, and inadequate infrastructure make it difficult for small-scale farmers to sustain livelihoods. As a result, child labour is often seen as an economic necessity to meet production demands and supplement family income.

Lebanon’s efforts to address child labour began in the early 2000s, following the ratification of ILO Conventions No. 182 and No. 138 and a Memorandum of Understanding with the ILO International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (IPEC). Over the past decade, multiple projects have been implemented in collaboration with the Ministry of Labour, employers, workers’ organizations, and national stakeholders to address child labour through policy measures and grassroots interventions.

Building on past achievements, the ILO, through the second phase of the Prospects programme, will implement a comprehensive set of upstream and downstream interventions to address child labour in agriculture. These efforts will be structured mainly around PROSPECTS pillar 3: Protection and Social protection with strong linkages with the programme’s first and second pillars: Education and learning (pillar 1) and Economic inclusion (pillar 2).

This Terms of Reference (ToR) outlines the framework for the next phase of action focusing on enhancing prevention and protection mechanisms, and promoting skills development and alternative livelihoods, in close coordination with key stakeholders, mainly the Ministries of Labour, Agriculture and of Social Affairs. The ILO will also cooperate with other PROSPECTS partners working on Child Labour, particularly UNICEF and UNHCR on both the upstream and downstream levels, to enhance referrals, the access of working children to education, and caregivers and older siblings' access to skills training and entrepreneurship program.  ILO interventions under this ToR will thus aim to reduce child labour in Lebanon’s agricultural sector, in the Akkar and Bekaa regions, by using an area based approach to address the root causes that push children into hazardous work and by introducing alternatives to child labour to the families of working children through the provision of entrepreneurship, financial education trainings and small grant to children’s caregivers as part of the activities to be executed under this ToR, and the referral to the skills activities implemented under a separate PROSPECTS intervention.

The approach will be tailored to the specific needs of working children and their families, ensuring their withdrawal from the worst forms of child labour, while reinforcing preventative efforts through a coordinated and sustainable mechanism.

Objective

The overall objective of this initiative is to reduce the Worst Forms of Child Labour in Agriculture among vulnerable communities (both Lebanese host communities and Syrian refugees) in Lebanon through an integrated, multi-sectoral approach, leveraging the ILO’s expertise and achievements in combating child labour.

The project will provide direct support to children already engaged in child labour within the agriculture sector as well as those at risk of entering child labour in the two areas of Akkar and Bekaa. This will be accomplished through a Systematic case management approach ensuring the withdrawal of 300 children from child labour in the target areas and the prevention of at least 600 children from engaging in labour through focused psychosocial support (PSS) sessions. ILO will ensure that these activities are closely coordinated with UNHCR and UNICEF through the different existing local platforms/centers.

Additionally, the project seeks to empower caregivers and older siblings of child labourers by enhancing their skills and improving their access to livelihood opportunities, thereby strengthening family resilience and reducing reliance on child labour. To facilitate the work on entrepreneurship and Financial Education, the ILO has developed training tools that are used worldwide for tens of years in several countries. These include “Generate your Business GYB”, “Start and Improve Your Business/SIYB” training and “Financial Education/FE” curricula. These tools are translated to Arabic, adapted to the Lebanese context, and will be used to extend entrepreneurship and financial education trainings to caregivers of child labourers within PROSPECTS’s targeted governorates of Akkar and Bekaa. Building on ILO’s ongoing work in this area, the training of caregivers also referred to in this ToR as Training of potential entrepreneurs (ToEs) will be facilitated by trainers selected from a pool of trainers who are already certified on the delivery of the SIYB and FE courses in Lebanon.

Partnership Key Activities

Below is an overview regarding the expected activities that the implementing partner will undertake:

1. Provide Case Management services to children in WFCL in the Agriculture sector (including cash assistance/transfer to parents provided in parallel with other case management interventions, and referrals to external services including education opportunities (formal education where possible, NFE and TVET centers led by Ministry of Education)
2. Provide Focused Psycho-social support to children at risk of child labour
3. Provide OSH training and protection equipment to child laborers (14 to 17) to be used for personal protection and first aid kits for treating minor injuries on the farm. The activity will consider the role of the Shawish in ensuring the safety of the working children). It will be done as part of the overall OSH intervention under PROSPECTS
4. Develop, tailor and deliver awareness raising activities to promote positive attitudes in the community regarding the value of education and increase the awareness of rural families and communities on the realities of child labour and its risk factors
5. Create an internal referral pathway for older siblings of children engaged in the worst forms of child Labour (to skills training, WBL and JSCs under the skills and economic inclusion components of the ILO -PROSPECTS programme
6. Implement the ILO Start and Improve your Business (SYB) program and Financial Education program and create an internal referral pathway for parents of children engaged in worse forms of child Labour to these training programs.
7. Provide micro/small grants to parents of child laborers to optimize skills utilization and start their own business
8. Support the coordination and work of the local CL committee in Akkar in coordination with the relevant ministries and local authorities and Support previously established CL committees in the North and Bekaa to address child labour by engaging ILO constituents, including social partners -workers/employers and sensitizing community members on the issue

Required Qualifications

Interested organizations/entities should demonstrate the following:

• Registered in Lebanon as a National or International NGO or a non-profit entity/organization
• Previous Experience and success in working with vulnerable children engaged in child labour including in the agriculture sector
• Strong outreach for vulnerable families working in agriculture in the two governorates of Akkar and Baalbek-Hermel
• At least 10 years of experience in case management
• Experience in Implementing training programs
• Previous experience of partnering with UN agencies and INGOs is an advantage

Submission Requirements

Interested non-profit organizations and entities are advised to check the enclosed Terms of Reference for further elaboration of the tasks and deliverables expected within the scope of this partnership.

The duration of the assignment is for 14 months over the period July 2025 – August 2026.

Interested organizations must submit the following:

• Technical proposal: The Technical proposal is expected to be submitted in the following structure:

• Organization’s profile demonstrating capacity and experience in tackling Child labour; Prevent and respond to child labour through the identification of children at risk, direct case management, Focused Psycho-social support and referrals.
• Detailed description of relevant past works and assignments related to child Protection and child Labour in Lebanon
• Prior and current experience in working with the ILO, other UN, and international organizations.
• Project Narrative Description: this section should provide a detailed explanation of the project, covering:

1. Project Goals and Purpose: Clearly define the project’s goal(s), ensuring they align with the identified needs. The project purpose should be measurable, realistic within the implementation period, and directly relevant to the priority area.
2. Project Activities and Methodology: Outline all proposed activities and describe the methodologies to be used for implementation. This section should clearly illustrate the relationship between project objectives, outputs, and activities.
3. Logical Framework and M&E methodology and plan: Define the expected quantitative and qualitative outputs of the project. Specify how progress will be monitored and outline the key indicators that will be used to measure the achievement of expected outputs.

• Detailed work plan: A structured table showing the various project activities and their implementation timeline.
• Key Staff and Expertise: Submit CVs of additional staff involved in project implementation, demonstrating their expertise and capacity to carry out the assignment.
• Risk Matrix and Mitigation Strategies: Identify possible challenges that may arise during project implementation and propose mitigation measures to address them effectively.

• Financial Proposal: The organization/entity should submit their financial proposal as per the template found in ANNEX 1
• Registration Documents