Teenagers Sadiq Mohammed (left) and Rasool Ali (right) stand beside their truck loaded with collected aluminum cans along the Baghdad–Samarra highway. The two friends sell the cans to recycling plants to help support their families. (Photo by 964media)
Salah Al-Din
Teenagers collect roadside cans to earn a living, highlighting child labor reality in Iraq
SALAH AL-DIN — Along a stretch of highway between Baghdad and Samarra, two Iraqi teenagers are making a living by collecting discarded aluminum cans and selling them to recycling plants — a modest effort that also contributes to cleaner streets.
Each day, 16-year-old Sadiq Mohammed and his friend Rasool Ali, 15, gather cans tossed along the roadside and sell them in Baghdad’s Hussainiya district, where scrap buyers pay 1,000 Iraqi dinars per kilogram — about $0.68.
The work is physically demanding, and the income is minimal. But for Sadiq and Rasool, who come from low-income families, it’s a lifeline.
“We’ve been doing this job for two years, along with my cousins,” Sadiq told 964media. “We found large quantities of empty cans in these areas. Some checkpoints let us through without issue. We come from Hussainiya to collect and sell them there.”
Their route spans numerous neighborhoods and security checkpoints. While some areas are accommodating, others pose challenges.
“We’re often stopped by residents or security forces, especially at checkpoints like Abayji and Sindiyah,” Rasool said. “But in Salah Al-Din, people have been very cooperative with us.”
The teenagers were once detained for 35 days along with their vehicle, a reminder of how precarious informal work can be in Iraq — particularly for minors.
Still, they see their work as valuable. “We help remove this waste from the streets from time to time,” Rasool said. “We ask for more support in other areas we visit. We come from poor families that rely on this to earn our daily bread.”
Iraq’s Labor Law No. 37 of 2015 sets the minimum legal working age at 15 and prohibits individuals under 18 from engaging in hazardous labor. Despite the law, child labor remains widespread — especially in informal sectors such as waste collection, street vending, and agriculture. Economic hardship, displacement, and limited access to education continue to drive underage workers into risky jobs.
