Modern slavery and Bonded Labour in construction supply chain

A new report and documentary by Anti-Slavery International and its partners reveals “appalling” levels of slavery in India’s brick kiln industry, including endemic presence of debt-bondage and child slavery. (https://www.antislavery.org/report-slavery-india-brick-kilns/) . If the global construction sector is to eradicate human rights abuses, wholesale change will be necessary. It will require new employment and recruitment models alongside forensic scrutiny of suppliers and purchasing methods. Organisations will be forced to acknowledge that policies alone are not enough. They must be backed up with hard evidence, measurable actions and strong leadership.

According to a Walk Free Foundation report in 2016, there were 46 million people enslaved worldwide in 2016. There were 18.3 million people in India living in the forms of modern slavery (about 39% of global slaves).

• According to the Global Slavery Index 2018, there were 18 million people living in modern slavery on any given day in 2016 in India.
• India ranked 53 among 167 countries in the index.
• North Korea topped the list and Japan at the bottom.
• But in absolute numbers, India topped the list on the prevalence of modern slavery due to its huge population.

There is no denying that change will take effort and has a cost attached to it. Apart from not knowing where to start, a common fear voiced by companies is how much these initiatives will eat into their margins. There is a concern that organisations that act first would be forced to raise their prices, losing their competitive edge in an already cutthroat market. But you could also ask: can you afford not to act? Public outcry at human rights abuses is growing, and in the age of the internet, global campaigns can take root in a matter of hours. For clients and organisations that choose to do nothing, the reputational risk looms ever larger. The effects of new legislation, notably the UK Government’s Modern Slavery Act 2015, will also ripple into global supply chains. EU countries can also expect changes under the Non Financial Reporting Directive. And human rights are covered in the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals for 2015. Organisations that act early are protecting their reputations and businesses, as well as future proofing themselves against increasingly stringent international legislation. We will now look at the problem in more depth in the following sections: the first deals with supply of labour; the second examines the procurement process for materials.

Forced labour and Debt bondage in India

• Bonded labour is defined in the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act of 1976 as a system of forced or partly forced labour in which a debtor gets an advance of cash or kind in return for his labour or service to the creditor.
• Forced labour and debt bondage are common practice across all the economic sectors in India.
• It is mainly found in certain industries such as brick kilns, carpet weaving, textile and garment manufacturing, embroidery, manual scavenging and agriculture.

Main issues of the brick and clan and construction industry may be :

Children:

• Children make a third of the total population in the brick kilns.
• 65 to 80% of children between the ages of five to fourteen reported working in the brick kilns. They work an average of nine hours a day in the summer months and seven hours a day in winter.
• 100% of older children interviewed (over the age of fourteen) reported working at the kiln. Children in this age group work on average 12 hours a day in summer months and 10 hours a day during the winter months.
• Work in the brick kilns for children would be considered as a ‘worst form of child labour’ under international law.
• 77% of workers reported not having access to primary education for their children between 5-13 years of age.

Adults:

• 84% of workers were paid a different rate to what had been agreed/promised at the beginning of the season.
• Workers reported on average fourteen hours a day in the summer months and 11 hours a day in the winter months.
• 100% of brick moulders were from traditionally marginalised classes and castes
• None of the women workers receive wages. Wages are paid to the male head of the household for the whole family. Women are not formally registered as workers and cannot access related employment benefits.
• 33% of workers reported being paid less than the minimum wage for 1000 bricks. From those workers who thought they’ve been paid a minimum wage, vast majority did not know what the minimum wage rate is.
• The workers never are paid overtime, despite routinely working 5 hours over daily legal limit.

Harmful environment:

• 87.72% of the kilns surveyed have access only to untreated ground water as drinking water, much of it polluted and sometimes not safe for drinking.
• 75.8% of all toilet facilities had no water provided to them at all.
• Worksites has a large amount of dust and other chemicals present.
• Living conditions can be cramped, with average housing dimensions for entire families being 7.6 square meters. By law, it’s required to be minimum 10 sq. meters.
• Schools are physically inaccessible. On average, it would take 40 minutes for children to walk to the nearest school.

Construction is a rapidly growing sector globally, with China, India, and the United States forecast to be the largest markets by 2030.3 The UN estimates that by 2025, 68% of the world population will live in urban areas, up from 55% today, which will require significant construction efforts. As part of China’s Belt and Road Initiative, projects worth more than US$500 billion have been or are being built. 

An estimated 7% of the global workforce is employed in the construction sector,6 and the Gulf’s construction sector alone employs around 10 million workers. Responsible

investors have a role to play in ensuring this growth doesn’t increase the risk of workers being forced into exploitation and abuse.