In 2013, the International Labour Organisation estimated that across the globe almost 21 million people were victims of forced labour. In Malaysia, almost one third of the 350,000 employees in the electronics sector are thought to be working in conditions comparable to slavery, according to a shock study published in 2014 by the NGO Vérité*.
Exploitation spreads. “We have led a lot of campaigns about this, also with big companies that are concerned, but there are still a lot of problems because the electronic industry has grown hugely”, confirms Pauline Overeem, international coordinator of the GoodElectronics network, which has been fighting since 2006 for the respect of human rights in this sector. She adds that “the situation will get worse because more and more goods are coming from the electronics industry now and because the exploitation of people is spreading from one country to another. Forced labour can also take really different forms.