Elimination of all forms of forced or compulsory labour

Bonded Labour in agriculture: a rapid assessment in Sindh and Balochistan, Pakistan

03 January 2004

This Working Paper is one of a series of Rapid Assessments of bonded labour in Pakistan, each of which examines a different economic sector. The aim of these studies is to inform the implementation of the Government of Pakistan’s National Policy and Plan of Action for the Abolition of Bonded Labour, adopted in 2001. Maliha Hussein and her collaborators were responsible for preparation of this paper on bonded labour in the agriculture sector in Sindh and Balochistan provinces. It should be read in conjunction with a companion paper that covers Punjab and North West Frontier Province.

Forced Labour: Definition, Indicators and Measurement

03 January 2004

This paper represents a first step to estimate the global magnitude of forced labour. It describes the various forms of forced labour in existence, reviews available indicators of forced labour, summarises and discusses some methods that have been used for measurement, and provides some guidance for future work on the subject.

Annotated bibliography on forced/bonded labour in India

01 December 2002

This bibliography provides a wide range of references on the subject of forced/bonded labour in India, which has multiple forms. Regardless of this multiplicity it is a negation of inalienable human rights, an affront to dignity, decency and worth of human existence, and anathema to civilised human conscience. Moreover, the prevalence of forced/bonded labour is also incompatible with decent work.

A Perspective Plan to Eliminate Forced Labour in India

01 July 2001

The problem of debt bondage in India is linked to the phenomenon of poverty, which is closely linked to the absence of land and assets. There is a strong commonality between the community of rural poor and victims of debt bondage, in as much as an overwhelming percentage of these belong to the category of landless agricultural labourers, a majority of whom also belong to the community of SC and ST.

Bonded labour in Pakistan

01 June 2001

This paper, based upon interviews with Government and non-governmental sources in Pakistan, as well as a survey of several thousand sharecropping tenant families in rural Sindh, was written as background material for the first ILO Global Report under the Declaration Follow-Up on the subject of Forced Labour.

Bonded labour in Pakistan: An overview

01 June 2001

This paper responds to some queries about the situation of debt bonded labour in Pakistan. Due to limitations of time, the paper is largely based upon a small set of interviews with government and non-governmental organizations in Sindh and Punjab, and upon some secondary material.

Stopping forced labour : global report under the follow-up to the ILO Declaration on fundamental principles and rights at work. Report of the Director-General, 2001

08 May 2001

Stopping Forced Labour

01 January 2001

Forced Labour is universally condemned. Yet the elimination of its numerous forms — old and new, ranging from slavery and debt bondage to trafficking in human beings — remains one of the most complex challenges facing local communities, national governments, employers’ and workers’ organizations and the international community. Tackling this denial of human freedom calls for multidimensional solutions to address the disparate forms that forced labour takes.