Many children in Vietnam have to work to support their families rather than being able to attend school. The Labor newspaper reported that 30 percent of Vietnamese children between the age of six to seventeen join the labor force. Most children stay close to home to help their family business. However, a report released by the Ministry of Labor – Invalid and Social Affairs in 2008 showed that there are 26,027 children that are in hard labor conditions in hazardous environment such as gold mines, timber operations or cargo transport. The actual number could be much larger as children employed as domestic servants, restaurant assistants or children working on the streets as beggars, shoes shiners or newspaper and lottery sellers were not covered in the report. The report also revealed that u