Children as young as seven are being taken out of school to help out on their family farm as drought tightens its grip on NSW.
UNICEF project 'In their own words' tracked the devastating toll the big dry has had on farming children as their families continue to struggle with dwindling livestock.
In some cases, children are being woken up before school to shoot starving animals to put them out of their misery.
'Before the start of this year I’d never shot a lamb in my life and I’ve done probably about 50 or so this year,' a Year 10 student said.
Children as young as seven are being taken out of school to help out on their family farm as the drought tightens its grip on NSW (pictured, Harry Taylor with bones of dead livestock on family farm at Coonabarabran)
UNICEF project 'In their own words' tracked the devastating toll the big dry has had on farming children as their families continue to struggle with dwindling livestock (pictured, Harry Taylor picks up a lamb to try and feed it with cotton seed)
'[Initially] I didn’t want to do it. Like, I cried sort of thing… but now it’s just easy. You just do it.'
Others say they have had to put homework on hold because they have to help out on the farm during after school hours.
'The problem is, you get home and you bust your a**e to feed stock until about 10 o’clock at night, and then you’ve got to do homework,' another Year 10 student said.
'And that’s the hardest thing. Like, you’re tired and you’re up til 12 and you’re tired the next day. So it just keeps piling up. It’s like a domino effect and it just gets worse and worse.'
For those studying distance education, learning has had to take a backseat.
'Others with children in primary school (distance education) are rotating siblings between helping out and attending school,' the report said.
As a Year 5 student explained, she and her brother would tag in to
