Observation (CEACR) - adopted 2024, published 113rd ILC session (2025)

Minimum Age Convention, 1973 (No. 138) - Oman (Ratification: 2005)

Article 2(3) of the Convention. Age of completion of compulsory education. Following its previous comments, the Committee takes note of the new School Education Law, promulgated by Royal Decree No. 31 of 2023. Pursuant to sections 24 and 27 of the new Law, education is compulsory from the age of 6 until the student completes basic education (grades 1 to 10) or reaches the age of 17. The Committee therefore observes that the age of completion of compulsory education (at least 16) remains higher than the minimum age for admission to employment or work, which is 15 (section 46 of the Child Law, Royal Decree No. 22 of 2014).

The Committee therefore once again requests that the Government take the necessary measures to raise the minimum age for admission to employment from 15 to 16 years of age, in order to link this age with the age of completion of schooling, in conformity with Article 2(3) of the Convention.

Labour inspection and application of the Convention in practice. The Committee recalls that section 46 of the Child Law, 2014, provides that the minimum age for admission to work does not apply to the employment of children in agricultural, fishing or artisanal, craft or administrative occupations in family businesses in which employment is restricted to the members of a single household and where it does not hinder the education of the child or impair his or her health or development.

The Committee notes, however, that the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child, in its concluding observations of 6 March 2023 (CRC/C/OMN/CO/5-6, paragraph 38), expressed concern about reports of engagement of children in hazardous work, including fishing and selling, and the lack of information on the extent of such engagement. It also expressed concern about children working in family businesses, and the absence of a legal minimum age in this regard.

The Committee once again recalls that the Government did not, at the time of ratification, avail itself of the possibility, under Article 4 of the Convention, of excluding family work or informal agricultural activities from the scope of the Convention. Therefore, the participation of children under the minimum age of admission to employment or work in child labour in small family undertakings must be prohibited, in conformity with the Convention. The Committee therefore once again requests the Government to take the necessary measures to strengthen the capacity and expand the reach of the labour inspectorate, to ensure the effective monitoring of children working in the informal economy and in family undertakings. The Committee requests the Government to provide information on the measures taken in this regard.