Introduction: Forced labour affects millions of people around the world. It can be found in every region, in almost all countries and in every kind of economy, according to the UN. It is defined as work which is exacted under the menace of a penalty and undertaken involuntarily. Forced labour can be imposed by the state or private agents and takes different forms, including debt bondage, chattel slavery and prison labour. A growing proportion of forced labourers are victims of human trafficking.

Middle East

Many women from Africa and Asia who work as domestic servants in the Middle East find themselves coerced into situations of debt bondage or involuntary servitude. Young boys from South Asia and East Africa are trafficked into some Gulf States to work as camel jockeys.

Africa

In Africa, victims of forced labour often come from distinct ethnic or religious groups. In certain countries, systems of chattel slavery are in place and hundreds of thousands of people are born into slavery. Forced labour is sometimes imposed by local authorities or by militias who abduct villagers and force them to fight or work for them. Trafficking routes run throughout Africa.

The International Labour Organization says there is evidence to suggest that children represent a higher proportion of forced labourers in Africa than in other parts of the world.

Europe

Trafficking appears to be the main route into forced labour in Europe. While much of the attention has been focused on victims of sexual exploitation, there is growing evidence that many are being trafficked for forced labour in agriculture, domestic service, construction work and sweatshops. Victims of forced labour in Europe come mainly from Asia, former Soviet republics, Eastern Europe and Africa.

South Asia

Millions of men, women and children are trapped in bonded labour across the region. They are often made to work as a means of repayment for a loan, which can trap whole families over many generations. In some cases bondage is the result of longstanding social or ethnic discrimination. Bonded labour in South Asia is found in agriculture, domestic work, the sex trade, brick kilns, glass industries, tanneries, and other manufacturing industries.

Asia Pacific

In parts of Asia, forced labour is exacted by the state or the military for multiple purposes. In Burma, villagers are sometimes forced to enlist in the army or work for it. Others are forced to work on public construction projects. In China, hundreds of thousands of prisoners are forced to work under the "re-education through labour system". Asia is also crossed by human trafficking routes, particularly used for sexual exploitation.

North America

Human trafficking routes run throughout the region, often leading into the US from Mexico, Canada, or overseas. Many of the tens of thousands of people who are trafficked into the US and Canada are forced into prostitution or domestic work, others become forced labourers on farms or factories. Most come from Asia and Latin America, but flows from Central and Eastern Europe are reported to be on the rise.

Latin America and Caribbean

Forced labour is most likely to affect rural or indigenous populations in remote areas of Latin America. Problems of debt bondage and abusive conditions have been documented in remote parts of the Amazon and the Andean region. The region is a place of origin, transit and destination for persons trafficked for sexual exploitation and labour. In the Caribbean, there are allegations of forced labour affecting Haitian migrants in the Dominican Republic and of children in Haiti being sold into domestic slavery.