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Nate Delaney
Jackie Burr, Instructor
English 1010, section 7
November 17, 2016
Factors and Possible Solutions to International Slavery Practices
With approximately 7 billion people on this Earth a lot of materials, and products are
taken from the Earth to provide for everyone. An exploding technology industry requires more
and more raw materials especially metals to stay afloat. The Congo is one of the most rich areas
in the world for minerals such as tungsten, tin, and tantalum. Many of these mining operations
are run by rogue militia groups. They get their workers by pillaging poverty-stricken villages and
taking any hands they can get. The workers do get paid however it is only enough to scrape by
and the workers are forced to pay illegal taxes to the militia groups. The workers do not get the
opportunity to leave with their families (Bailey).
Lets look a little bit to the West in the Ivory Coast to their biggest export, cocoa beans.
Over the last few decades since the 1950s cocoa and especially chocolate have become
exponentially more popular world wide. Cocoa plantations in the Ivory Coast are generally small
and family owned. The harvesting process requires a lot of labor between cutting down pods,
splitting pods to extract the beans, cleaning and drying the beans, and packing the beans to take
to the town and sell. Since the plantations are generally family farms the children help out of
necessity simply to help keep the family afloat financially. The average cocoa farmer makes ten
times lower than the international poverty line. Meaning if you multiplied their income by ten
they would still be impoverished (Cocoa-Nomics). Now companies seem to be willing to pay

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less for cocoa but also they expect more. When in reality they should be paying more for more
product. One consequence for this drop in pay is that many farmers are leaving the business to go
to the cities looking for work. This in turn creates a lot more work for fewer people.
Most of the slave labor worldwide comes from poor areas. Third world countries dont
have as much structure as first world countries therefore they miss out on a lot of laws, namely
labor laws. With a large poor population many people would rather enter indentured servitude
than have their family starve (Bales,Winning).
India has become the largest provider of slave labor. Walk Free, The leading organization
against slave and child labor, Estimates 18 million slaves in India, approximately 40% of all
worldwide slaves. Indias government has instated laws to restrict manufacturers from using
slave and child labor. Since labor practices like this are so publically acceptable there is little
enforcement and most of slavery goes overlooked. With more public awareness of how much
slavery is a problem some industries in india have gone almost completely slaveless. The carpet
industry used to employ almost 300,000 slaves and children now that number has decreased to

Fig. 1. Richard gives the cocoa farmers their first bit of chocolate. (Cocoa-Nomics)

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between 10,000 and 5,000 (Sharma).

On an international level the United Nations has created many laws to stop slavery in
production. Reaching out to many companies and governments all around the world to support
the cause. Since the United Nations is purely diplomatic the only way to enforce the culprits in
with fines, however the United Nations has to go through a lot of hoops of investigation and
resources to finalize the fines. With the lack of an army they cant honestly make anyone do
anything. Lots of countries and companies can easily get around the laws(Wincup).
The Walk Free organization estimates that 46 million people enslaved and the industry is
worth about $31 billion (PR). With simple division we can approximate that each slave is worth
$675. The only big difference between then and now is that slaves are now worth less. To put
that in perspective a slave in the south United States in 1860 would cost about $120 with
inflation it would translate to about $3,200 today. Slaves now are taken from their families to
work. Pillaging villages for the strong, killing the weak, and using women for sex. Then they
leave the village in flames destroying everything. Many slave owners and militias use scare
tactics and sexual assault on women and girls to break innocent people into submission. With
these tactics the victim soon become property with nowhere to go (Bales).
The criminals make profits on their new property. Sex trafficking has become a very
large problems in many large cities around the world. Those girls are sent out on the streets every
night with nothing but maybe a few dollars. They arent allowed to come back to their new home
until they have money to give to their master. In the Congo militias and rogue military groups are
taking people from their families and homes to work in mines to get precious minerals especially

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gold. They are able to make a lot of money off the underground markets all at the
expense of making a person become nothing but a disposable object. That income turns into
more people and a larger empire. In areas like the Congo it becomes an arms race with many
militias waging wars with others for more slaves, money, and power (Bailey).
Back to the Ivory Coast with the large cocoa production and the changes being made in
the large chocolate production companies like Nestle, Mars, and Hershey. These businesses have
only recently claimed that they use child labor and will begin to help it. Nestle is working on
growing cocoa trees that are more resistant to disease and Hershey are focusing on education.
Richard Quest with CNN has an interview with Jose Lopez, The man responsible for Nestles
global operations, and asks him why the chocolate industry was so late to admit to and deal with
the problem of child labor.
Jose: Probably because finding solutions was not so easy, but it is not such
a process where nothing gets done and all of the sudden things get done.
Richard: But you seem to be having a difficulty with accepting that the
industry was late to dealing with this.
Jose: I have to say that we were late because a problem like this has to be
dealt with so any time that has been lost was lost, and that should not have
happened
With lots of factors going into a very complex and widespread issue the need to look for
multiple solutions is necessary as some may not work in certain corners of the Earth. A key part
to a solution is simply public awareness. A large network of eyes seeing everything that goes on
and reporting the issues to local authorities. Boycotts of specific products and businesses until

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the changes are made will push businesses to change to provide free work. However with this
factor to a solution it becomes a matter of will enough people participate to honestly make a
difference. They need to have strong enough feelings against slavery to stop using products as
simple as carpets, or as complicated as smartphones.
International labor laws could work but with the system we have today with the United
Nations and other groups will not, unless they implement a new penalty system. The current
system is inefficient and easy to bypass. With tighter laws and regulations they could make it
harder to get around but large companies always seem to find ways around it.
Laws have been made requiring businesses to release information on where they get their
materials but the truth is that many materials used by large companies go through very long
supply chains making it nearly untraceable. Given that the company does know where it comes
from they can easily claim that they dont know the supply chain and get away with it. The
modern slavery act which was approved in 2015 requires businesses over a certain size to submit
a report disclosing all the actions that they have taken over the last year to reduce slave labor and
human trafficking in their supply chains(Wincup).
Most slave labor is not possible on a large scale due to these new rules and regulations set
on large companies. Instead many small sweatshops, mining operations, and farms operate under
the radar in areas that are not as rich and structured. Local labor laws in a lot of third world
locations can make a huge difference. Many people looking at the small scale instead of just
looking at the big picture.
Even more importantly than seeing the problem is enforcing those new laws. India has
laws against child and slave labor however since it is so widely accepted in most of the country

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that the police are very lenient on the matter. Like speeding, if everyone does it is it still a
problem? With law enforcement acting like that and not doing their job of enforcing the law then
progress is not made. There is no reason to stop using people if you wont be punished. Swami
Agnivesh a humans rights activist from India speaks on the issue with the government and police
in the area. The laws are there, but there is no political will on the part of the government to
implement them. . . The government can't afford to annoy rural rich as well as the urban rich who
are exploiting the situation"(Sharma). This makes the situation in India look like the government
is looking to please the rich and powerful for whatever reason. Whether to maintain office,
avoid revolution or simply to stay on the global scale. Indias economy is booming with many
large corporations outsourcing and looking to them for resources and production. By pleasing the
small portion of people on top of the economic scale they have 18 million men, women, and
children enslaved.
A large slave trade, similar to the one in the 1800s, is non-existent with most slave
operations pull from local sources. In South East Asia slaves are pulled from many of the
surrounding islands. With the current international waters laws once they leave land there is very
little that can be done to stop them. New regulations could slow or stop the trade across seas.
Since most slaves are bought and pulled from poor areas with little structure, they need to get to
the point where they could create a system to monitor and check boats legally.(Bales)
Not everywhere in the world is to the point where they could eradicate slavery. Many
areas are too poor or do not have the structure to implement and enforce new laws against old
traditions. The best thing we can do now to start moving toward a better future is to increase
public awareness. Most people know that slavery happens but to what degree. Do they

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understand that a lot of the products around have something that came from slave labor. When
people learn the issues and how it affects people, changes can be made. The populous controls
what goes on in our world on an international level but even more importantly a local level. With
more public knowledge more questions will emerge asking more companies about it pushing for
more accountability. Boycotts are a possibility but unlikely, however they would really speed up
the process exponentially. Creating a second front one from the public and another from
business. With a metaphorical two front war things will very much speed up.

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Works Cited:
Bales, Kevin. Blood and Earth: Modern Slavery, Ecocide, and the Secret to Saving the World.
Random House Publishing Group, Jan 2016.
---. "Winning The Fight." Harvard International Review31.1 (2009): 14.
MasterFILE Complete. Web. 30 Oct. 2016.
Bailey, Brandon - AP Technology, Writer. "Report: Gunmen Still Control Metals Mined
For Modern Gadgets." APTop News Package (2016): Newswires. Web. 29 Oct. 2016.
Cocoa-Nomics. CNN.com. CNN. n.d. Web. 28 Oct 2016
"Ending Modern Slavery: What Is the Best Way Forward? - Humanity United." Humanity
United. N.p., 04 Feb. 2015. Web. 24 Oct. 2016.
PR, Newswire. "Walk Free Calls on Big Business to End Slavery Worldwide." PR Newswire US
16 Dec. 2012: Regional Business News. Web. 29 Oct. 2016.
Whincup, David, Simon Garbett, and Clare McNicholas. "The Modern Slavery Act 2015: 10
Key Points For Businesses." Employee Relations Law Journal 41.4 (2016): 64-68.
Business Source Premier. Web. 29 Oct. 2016.
Sharma, Ashok - Associated, Press. "India Tops World Slavery List, But Activists See
Improvement." AP Top News Package(2016): Newswires. Web. 29 Oct. 2016.