Slavery and child labor one year after the G7 Elmau pledge
For over 9 years now I have demanded, as an opinion journalist and human rights activist, from the political leaders of the G7, the European Union, Switzerland, Norway, the G20 nations, and all other governments, also the World Economic Forum and the top executives, board members and shareholders of all corporations to commit to #ZeroChildLabor.
Last year, in June, I traveled to Elmau, Germany, to continue to demand that the leaders of the G7 and the European Union finally commit to working together to eradicate forced labor and child labor in their countries and in their nations’ supply chains. I sent this letter to all G7 leaders (see link here).
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In June 2022, while traveling by train to Elmau (Garmisch Partenkirchen) to talk to journalists covering the G7 Summit, I received a call that the G7 leaders had decided to include my demands in their final declaration. I could not believe it.
The caller told me that the White House was going to post it on its website in a few hours. The White House posted the pledge included in the text of the Elmau Declaration! I read it over and over to try to find the fine print. There was none.
It was a turning point for all of us who demand the elimination of forced labor and child labor. My question was: When will the G7 governments and the European Union have real action plans with very clear goals?
This is how EFE agency published the news a year ago:
“The G7 includes in its conclusions the fight against slave labor in supply chains. That is, to exclude from global trade those products manufactured under exploitative labor conditions”.
“It is considered a milestone, since such a pronouncement has never before been achieved at the level of the seven major powers, apparently determined to combat, by extension, the scourge of child labor, since labor slavery mainly affects children in the most disadvantaged world”.
To my great disappointment, most of the media covering the G7 Summit failed to report this historic commitment of the G7 leaders. So far, not a single major media outlet in Germany has even published that the G7 leaders made a commitment in Germany to eliminate child labor and forced labor.
This is absolutely unacceptable because Germany profits from the exploitation of millions of non-white children and all German journalists are aware of it. Even German journalists have told me that Germany and the EU did not commit to this in Elmau. Unglaublich!
One year after the Elmau G7 Summit, the world today has more slaves than ever before (see link here) and child labor has increased. More than 300 million children work worldwide and almost 100 million work in supply chains.
Despite the commitment by G7 and EU leaders at the Elmau, Germany, Summit in June 2022 to fight to eliminate slave and child labor in their supply chains, and to reiterate that commitment at the Hiroshima G7 Summit in May 2023, none of the G7 or EU governments have implemented strong action or created an action plan to eliminate the exploitation of forced or child labor in their countries or in their supply chains.
One year after the Elmau G7 Summit, G7 and EU governments have failed to combat child labor or forced labor even within their own borders. One million children work in the United States, more than one million in the European Union. Italy’s government recently admitted that 336,000 children work in Italy (see link here).
To date, the European Union has been unwilling to conduct a study on the true extent of child labor in its 27 Member States. It is impossible to solve the problem of child labor in the EU or in EU supply chains without knowing, or without wanting to know, how many children are working, where they are, and for whom they are working.
As if child labor within the borders of the G7 and the EU were not already a very serious problem, tens of millions of children are still working today in U.S. and EU supply chains. The other G7 countries, Japan, the United Kingdom, and Canada, also continue to have millions of children working in their supply chains.
The German Supply Chain Due Diligence Act (Lieferkettengesetz) and the EU Due Diligence Directive under discussion in Brussels lack instruments for states to punish the economic beneficiaries of forced or child labor. In addition, they make it more difficult for the victims to hold the exploiters liable.
The European Union is debating in Brussels a directive that will continue to allow the annual import of hundreds of billions of euros worth of goods produced with child labor and will only ban the import of some goods with forced labor, leaving member states free to decide at their discretion. This is despite the fact that EU Member States have committed to eradicating child labor by the end of 2025.
Despite the commitment made by President Joe Biden at the last two G7 summits, at least 10 U.S. states have bills to “legalize” some forms of child labor.
Arkansas and Iowa have already passed laws allowing child labor in many industries, putting the safety and well-being of children at risk. Child labor for 12-year-olds remains legal in the United States, a historical legacy of racism in that nation.
Despite Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s commitment at the G7 Summits and the Three Amigos Summit in Mexico in January 2023, the Canadian Parliament this year passed Bill S-211, misnamed the “Combating Forced Labor and Child Labor in Supply Chains and Amending the Customs Tariff Act”.
This Canadian law, like laws in Germany and the United Kingdom to the same end, is nothing more than a paper tiger, without claws or teeth, which protects companies that use forced or child labor in their supply chains, requiring only that they submit a report.
The province of Quebec passed a law in May that allows 12-year-olds to work in agriculture. This violates Canada’s obligations under the Convention on the Rights of the Child.
The real figures of child labor in the world
Today, more than 300 million children work in the world, and not only 160 million, as estimated by UNICEF and the ILO. UNICEF and the ILO underestimate child labor figures by more than 100 million children in Asia, more than 30 million in Africa, and more than 20 million in Latin America.
A study by Lichand and Wolf, academics at the Universities of Zurich and Pennsylvania, estimates the total number of working children at 373 million (see link here).
The slave labor situation in G7 and EU countries
According to the 2023 study on modern slavery by the Walk Free Foundation and the International Labor Organization, the world has more slaves today than ever before. The G7 and EU countries have more than two million slaves (modern slaves) within their borders.
Slavery in the supply chains of the G7 and EU countries is a much more serious problem. These 30 rich countries have almost 20 million slaves in their supply chains. This is a clear violation of their state obligations to protect human rights, children’s rights, and labor rights.
This is the estimated number of people living in slavery in the G7 countries:
United States: 1,091,000 Italy: 197,000 Japan: 144,000 France: 135,000 United Kingdom: 122,000 Canada: 69,000 Germany: 47,000
Modern slavery is also a serious problem in the rest of the European Union (partial list. Source: 2023 Walk Free Foundation-ILO study):
Poland: 209,000 Romania: 145,000 Spain: 108,000 Greece: 66,000 Hungary: 63,000 Bulgaria: 59,000 Slovakia: 42,000 Portugal: 39,000 Croatia: 22,000 Lithuania: 17,000 Austria: 17,000 Belgium: 11,000 Netherlands: 10,000
Slavery also exists in Slovenia, Estonia, Latvia, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Ireland, etc.
The key questions in my mind are:
1. Why haven’t the German media and most of the EU media published that the G7 and EU leaders committed in Elmau (Germany) in June 2022 to eliminate forced labor and child labor? More than one million children work in the EU and tens of millions of children work in EU supply chains.
2. Which of the thousands of senior journalists covering the G7 and EU leaders will dare to ask the heads of government:
A. When will the G7 and EU governments have a real action plan with very clear targets to eliminate forced labor and child labor?
B. When will the G7 and the EU conduct serious studies to determine at least: How many children work? Where? And for whom do they work?
It is impossible to solve this very serious problem without knowing its true dimension.
3. When will Mr. Antonio Guterres, Secretary-General of the United Nations, UNICEF, ILO, UNDP, and all UN organizations eliminate child and forced labor at least in their own cafeteria supply chains? All nations and the UN are committed to eliminating child labor by 2025.
I look forward to your comments or questions. My Twitter accounts are: @FernandoMdelaC @LewisHineOrg.
Fernando Morales-de la Cruz is a journalist and human rights activist focused on eliminating child labor and forced labor in the supply chains of all companies and all developed nations. He is the founder and editor-in-chief of @LewisHineOrg and @cartoons4change.
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