ISLAMABAD: The ‘Global Estimates of Modern Slavery’, published on Monday says 50 million people are living in modern slavery in 2021, and of these people, 28m are in forced labour and 22m are trapped in forced marriage.

The report from the International Labour Organisation (ILO) further says the number of people in modern slavery has risen significantly in the last five years. Ten million more people were in modern slavery in 2021, compared to 2016 global estimates. Women and children remain disproportionately vulnerable.

The ILO report says no region of the world is spared from forced labour, and Asia and the Pacific is host to more than half of the global total (15.1m), followed by Europe and Central Asia (4.1m), Africa (3.8m), the Americas (3.6m), and the Arab States (0.9m).

However, this regional ranking changes considerably when forced labour is expressed as a proportion of the population. By this measure, forced labour is highest in the Arab States (5.3 per 1,000 people), followed by Europe and Central Asia (4.4 per 1,000), the Americas and Asia and the Pacific (both at 3.5 per 1,000), and Africa (2.9 per 1,000).

More than half of all forced labour occurs in upper-middle or high-income countries

The report says more than half of all forced labour occurs in either upper-middle income or high-income countries.

There are 27.6m people in situations of forced labour on any given day. This absolute number translates to 3.5 people in forced labour for every 1,000 people in the world. Women and girls make up 11.8m of the total in forced labour. More than 3.3m of all those in forced labour are children.

The initial months of the Covid-19 pandemic were accompanied by widespread reports of forced labour linked to the crisis. Disruptions to income because of the pandemic led to greater indebtedness among workers and with it reports of a rise in debt bondage among some workers lacking access to formal credit channels.

According to the report, 86 per cent of forced labour cases are imposed by private actors — 63pc in the private economy in sectors other than commercial sexual exploitation and 23pc in forced commercial sexual exploitation. State-imposed forced labour accounts for the remaining 14pc of people in forced labour.

The five sectors accounting for the majority of total adult forced labour (87pc) are services (excluding domestic work), manufacturing, construction, agriculture (excluding fishing), and domestic work. Other sectors form smaller shares but nonetheless still account for hundreds of thousands of people.

The number of men, women, and children living in forced marriages has risen globally. There was a 6.6m increase in the number of people living in a forced marriage between 2016 and 2021. During this time, the prevalence of forced marriage rose from 2.1 to 2.8 per 1,000 people.

Nearly two-thirds of all forced marriages, an estimated 14.2m people, are in Asia and the Pacific. This is followed by 14.5pc in Africa (3.2m) and 10.4pc Europe and Central Asia (2.3m).

When regional population is accounted for, the Arab States is the region with the highest prevalence at 4.8 per 1,000 people, followed by Asia and the Pacific at 3.3 per 1,000. The Americas has the lowest prevalence of forced marriage at 1.5 per 1,000 people.

Published in Dawn, September 13th, 2022