Sandra has had five years of school. As with garments, child labor appears mostly in small shops and in home production. The system of rural delivery of cut pieces for finishing into casual shoes for eventual sale by foreign retailers is well documented, in one case showing children as young as 10 and 11 years stitching shoes. 14 Child labor in the shoe industry merits further investigation. Ceramics Children are used in the production of brick-red table and oven pottery, fine china, and pottery ornaments in the ceramics industry located in the municipality of Barcelos.
Children carry and work the clay in addition to painting designs on the pottery.
15 Several reports found that children in the ceramics industry often work only during school vacations or attend school for half the day and then work the other half in small workshops. 17 Young boys were found to work with family members breaking cobblestones, coping-stones and paving stones to be used in road construction. They hammer at the stone with chisels and mallets, unprotected from the dust and granite chips. Typically, a man will rent a small shack for stone-breaking and his family will come to work with him, including his children. Exports are thought to go primarily to France and Spain, though there are reports of granite stones being exported to the United States for use in pavements.