Reducing child labour in Panama: An impact evaluation

This article examines the impact of two specifically designed educational programmes aimed at reducing child labour among the indigenous population in Panama: a tutoring course (CEC) and an accelerated primary school/course (EPA). Based on a sample of 427 children belonging to 185 households, and using a post-intervention treatment and comparison group design, we find that the CEC programme decreased the probability of working (child labour) by 10.7 per cent and increased the probability of participating in an extracurricular activity by 23.5 per cent. Thus, the programme limited the possibility of CEC participants becoming involved in agricultural-related or other forms of child labour. Because results from the EPA programme are statistically insignificant, we are uncertain about the direct impact of EPAs on the overall goal of child labour reduction.