OUR North KoreaEritrea and Mauritania have the highest rates of modern slavery in the world, according to the 2023 Global Slavery Index released today, which notes the worsening situation worldwide since the last report five years ago.

The report estimates that about 50 million people lived under modern slavery in 2021, ten million more than in 2016, when the situation was last assessed.

This figure also includes 28 million people in forced labor and 22 million in forced marriages.

The situation is deteriorating amid rising armed conflict, widespread environmental degradation and the impact of the coronavirus pandemic, among other factors, the report concludes.

Report compiled by an NGO for Human rights Walk Free defines modern slavery as “forced labor, forced marriage, debt bondage, and sexual exploitation” or even “human trafficking and child exploitation.”

The definition of slavery includes the systematic deprivation of a person of freedom – from the right to accept or refuse work to the freedom to decide whether, when and with whom.

According to this indicator, authoritarian and isolated North Korea has the highest rate of modern slavery (104.6 per 1,000 inhabitants). It is followed by Eritrea (90.3) and Mauritania (32), which in 1981 became the last country in the world to ban hereditary slavery.

Also in the top ten of the world ranking are Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait, where the rights of labor migrants are limited due to the system of sponsorship or guardianship “kafala”.

Other countries in the top ten are Turkey, “which is hosting millions of refugees from Syria”, Tajikistan, Russia and Afghanistan.

While forced labor is more prevalent in low-income countries, it is “closely” linked to demand in higher-income countries, the report says, noting that two-thirds of all forced labor occurs in global supply chains.

The G20 countries, which include the world’s 19 largest economies and the EU, import $468 billion worth of goods that can be produced using forced labor, up from $354 billion in the previous report, according to the report.

Electronic devices are the top product in this category, followed by clothing, palm oil and solar panels.

Source: APE-MPE, AFP.