List of Goods Produced by Child Labor or Forced Labor

There are reports that adults are forced to work in the mining of gold in Venezuela.  Research indicates that forced labor occurs throughout the Orinoco Mining Arc, a swath of land in Venezuela’s southern Bolivar state, where the majority of Venezuela’s gold is concentrated.  It is estimated that there are between 300,000 and 500,000 gold miners in Venezuela.  Mines are largely run by armed and violent criminal groups, and research shows evidence that officials from the Government of Venezuela, including members of security forces and local authorities, have colluded with and allowed members of non-state armed groups to commit human rights violations and labor abuses.  Miners experience unsafe working conditions, unsafe and degrading living conditions, extortion and financial penalties, limited freedom of communication, and threats of violence and torture.

Spanish Translation

There are reports that children, mostly boys ages 4-17, are forced to quarry granite in Nigeria. Some children are abducted and trafficked from within Nigeria and from Benin to work in granite quarries and mines in the Federal Capital Territory, as well as the states of Ebonyi, Enugu, Ogun, Oyo, and Osun. Reports from the United Nations (UN) and media indicate that between 5,000 and 6,000 children from Benin alone were forced to work in the granite quarries; multiple government rescue operations identified between 50 and 200 children engaged in this work at a time. The children are forced to work up to 16 hours a day, even when they are sick. Many are forced to work under threat of physical violence. Children are often forced to sleep outside and are denied food. Reports indicate that children frequently die while working, having been forced to work under extreme conditions.

There are reports that children, mostly boys as young as age four, are forced to excavate and process gravel in Nigeria. According to reports from the media and government raids, 5,000 children from Nigeria and Benin are working in forced gravel production in Nigeria. The children are trafficked from Benin and forced to work, on average for a total of six years, in gravel pits in the Ogun, Osun, and Oyo states. An NGO study revealed that hundreds of children had been trafficked from Zou province in Benin to work in gravel production; other reports have found that hundreds of children have been rescued from this forced labor and returned to other areas in Benin. These children are forced to work excessive hours and to sleep in the bush near the pits. They are threatened with physical violence and tortured by the work gang leaders, particularly if they fail to meet their daily work quotas. The children are forced to work under extreme, sometimes fatal, conditions.

There are reports that thousands of adult ethnic minority workers are forcibly employed in factories producing hair products such as wigs.  China produces more than 80 percent of the global market’s products made from hair and is the world’s largest exporter of these products.  Victim testimonies, news media, and think tanks report that factories, including for hair products, frequently engage in coercive recruitment; limit workers’ freedom of movement and communication; and subject workers to constant surveillance, retribution for religious beliefs, exclusion from community and social life, and isolation.  Further, workers in these factories can be subject to regular government propaganda, extremely long hours, and little to no pay.  More broadly, according to varied estimates, at least 100,000 to hundreds of thousands of Uyghurs, ethnic Kazakhs, and other Muslim minorities are being subjected to forced labor in China following detention in re-education camps.  In addition to this, poor workers in rural areas may also experience coercion without detention.  Workers can be placed at factories within the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, where the camps are located, or be transferred out of Xinjiang to factories in eastern China.

Chinese Translation

There are reports that adult workers are forced to work in the production of palm oil in Indonesia.  The palm oil industry is labor-intensive and employs between 3.7 million and 8 million workers.  According to local media and NGO reports, thousands of individuals have been subjected to forced labor in the production of palm oil.  Many of the workers on palm oil plantations are internal migrants within Indonesia, some of whom had to pay high recruitment fees leading to debt.  It is widely reported that palm oil harvesters’ daily targets, which are set by companies, are unachievable within a 7-hour workday, compelling workers to work several hours beyond what the law permits without overtime pay because they fear steep deductions in wages if they do not meet their targets.  Individuals work in remote, isolated plantations with limited freedom of movement and communication.  Victims and local NGOs report that some workers who live on the plantation experience degrading living conditions, with no access to clean water or latrines.  Some workers who work with hazardous pesticides and fertilizers are not provided with personal protective equipment, and they experience health problems and increased risks of injury from exposure to dangerous chemicals.