Email rightslab@nottingham.ac.uk to hear more about the Rights Lab
Research
Slavery from Space allows you to assist us in our mission to end slavery by mapping the locations of activities in which people are frequently found to be enslaved. Your efforts will provide intelligence to both humanitarian workers delivering aid on the ground and policy/decision makers, to understand the processes that enable slavery.
Why brick kilns?
The traditional brick making industry underpins urban development throughout South Asia, employing millions of people and hundreds of thousands of animals working and living in hazardous conditions. In India, the demand for infrastructure and services will continue to grow as its towns and cities are projected to rise by an additional 404 million people by 2050. India's construction industry already provides about 35 million jobs and contributes 8 per cent of its Gross Domestic Product.
The Human Cost
In contravention of international law, up to 68 per cent of the 4.4 to 5.2 million brick kiln workers in South Asia are estimated to be working in bonded and forced labour conditions and approximately 19 per cent of the region's documented brick kiln workers are under 18 years of age. In the Punjab, Anti-slavery International (2017) report that brick kiln owners provide workers with loans at the beginning of the season, which immediately puts them into debt and entraps them for an entire season before being paid. Since no records are kept, brick kiln owners often pay less than they promise and pay "per brick", which equates to well below minimum wages on a timed-based system and results in unpaid overtime being the norm. Furthermore, children in the Punjab work long hours year-round, and lack access to primary education.
The Environmental Cost
Traditional brick kilns harm the environment through their high usage of fertile topsoil to make the bricks and the nature of emissions from the chimneys during the firing process. India alone consumes 350 million tonnes of topsoil and clay to make some 200 billion bricks and its brick kiln industry is the third-largest industrial coal consumer in country, using 24 million tonnes of coal each year, which equates to emissions of 78 million tonnes of carbon dioxide. Almost 9/10 of kilns surveyed in the Punjab are reported to have access to untreated ground water to drink, much of which is polluted and unsafe; around 3/4 toilet facilities were also found to have no water supply.
Where can I find out more?
This project is just the beginning of a much wider effort at the University of Nottingham to develop novel approaches to the monitoring and measurement of the prevalence of modern slavery. Please visit the University of Nottingham's Rights Lab website to find out more about the work behind this research. You can read more about slavery within the brick kiln industry in a report published in 2017 by the International Labour Organization and Anti-slavery International's 2017 report on the Punjab.