Did a slave make your jumper?
It was naïve to believe that slavery could be ended just by changing the law.
It has been abolished hundreds of times and in hundreds of places, from ancient Greece, China and India until now. The United States Constitution banned slavery in 1865, but that amendment was not formally ratified in Kentucky until 1976 and in Mississippi until 2013.
Britain’s Slavery Abolition Act was passed in 1835 but legal slavery continued in much of the British Empire until well into the 20th century. And in many places it continues as it always did, in defiance of the law and often with the collusion of authorities.
Slavery is far too economically attractive to disappear. Instead, it retreats, changes its appearance, moves to more congenial surroundings.
So a new international wave of laws has appeared to fight what’s now known as “modern slavery”. The Walk Free Foundation, an anti-slavery organisation founded by the Australian mining billionaire Andrew Forrest, describes it this way:
Modern slavery covers a set of specific legal concepts including forced labour, debt bondage, forced marriage, slavery and slavery-like practices, and human trafficking … Essentially, it refers to situations of exploitation that a person cannot refuse or leave because of threats, violence, coercion, deception, and/or abuse of power.
Walk Free’s Global Slavery Index estimates that about 40 million people worldwide are effectively slaves. This includes 25 million in forced labour and 15.4 million in forced marriages. North Korea tops the list. According to the index, over 10% of the entire population are in conditions of modern slavery.
The top ten in the world, rated on a percentage of the population who are slaves, are:
1) North Korea (104.6 per 1,000 population)
2) Eritrea (93 per 1,000 population)
3) Burundi (40 per 1,000 population)
4) Central African Republic (22.3 per 1,000 population)
5) Afghanistan (22.2 per 1,000 population)
6) Mauritania (21.4 per 1,000 population)
7) South Sudan (20.5 per 1,000 population)
8) Pakistan (16.8 per 1,000 population)
9) Cambodia (16.8 per 1,000 population)
10) Iran (16.2 per 1,000 population).
But for sheer numbers, India is at or near the top, with an estimated 18 million people -- many of them children – working and living as slaves.
 |
| India has an estimated 18 million slaves, including children. |
THE SLAVERY WE IMPORT
According to the Walk Free international survey, Australia imports many billions of dollars worth of goods which are likely or certainly produced with slave labour. From China, we import slavery-tainted electronic goods worth $9 billion a year, garments worth $5.5 billion and fish worth $67 million.
 |
| Uyghur forced labour in Xingiang: profit combined with political repression |
China produces 10% of the world’s cotton, much of it grown and processed by Uyghur forced labour in the country’s west. According to a recent report by the Human Rights Law Centre:
Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslims have reportedly been beaten, tortured, sterilised, electrocuted, and subject to sexual violence. Many are also reportedly forced to work in factories constructed within or near these camps, often for little to no pay. More than 21 million square feet of factory space – about 10 times the size of the Melbourne Cricket Ground – is estimated to have been built within camps across Xinjiang …
The Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) has estimated that over 80,000 Uyghurs were transported out of Xinjiang between 2017 and 2019. They report that brokers advertise Uyghur workers online, claiming they can “withstand hardship”’ and “semi-military style management” and that factories receive government rebates of up to Ò°5,000 (AUD$997) for every Uyghur they use.
According to the Global Slavery Index, the top five imports most at risk of being produced wholly or in part by slaves are:
1) Electronics from China and Malaysia;
2) Garments from China, India, Vietnam, Thailand and Malaysia;
3) Fish from Thailand, Indonesia, China and Taiwan;
4) Rice from India; and
5) Cocoa from Cote d’Ivoire and Ghana.
The Human Rights Law Centre report highlighted four major areas of concern – garments from China, plastic gloves from Malaysia, seafood from Thailand – and horticultural products from Australia.
WHAT ARE WE DOING ABOUT IT? (SPOILER: NOT MUCH)
There is some progress. Thanks to unions and the Fair Work Commission – not the government – growers will now be required to pay fruit-pickers a liveable wage. Enforcing the new rules is another story.
A Modern Slavery Act came into force in December 2018. It requires companies to report regularly on whether their supply chains involve slave labour. But there are no penalties for failing to report, or for reporting inaccurately. It was intended to “name and shame” those who continued to support slavery – but that has just not happened.
The most effective way of preventing slavery is to make it unprofitable. Mechanisation in agriculture made slavery unprofitable on most farms in most developed countries. Our Modern Slavery Act provides no penalty for importing or selling goods made with slave labour. If it did – and if it was enforced – it would have a real-world impact on the lives of some of the world’s most vulnerable people.
The United States has moved on this but we haven’t. In December, President Joe Biden signed into law a measure banning the import of goods made with Uyghur forced labour. In Australia, a similar bill proposed by Senator Rex Patrick got nowhere and was removed from the notice paper in June last year.