Unfortunately in this day and age, slavery in Brazil isn’t something that is found only in history books. The sad reality is that even 118 years after the abolition of slavery, the International Labour Organization reports that there are around 25,000 slave workers in the rural areas of Brazil. The world figure for forced labor is estimated at 12.3 million people.
In this contemporary Brazilian slavery, rural landlords use illegal agents known as “Cats” to find their slaves. The Cats will recruit people to work in forests, illegally cutting down native trees to make charcoal for the local industries.
“These workers are usually illiterate, without identification documents, homeless and with no qualifications,” says Xavier Jean Marie Plassat, leader of CPT (Comissao Patoral da Terra), the campaign against slave labor in Brazil.
At first, the Cats offer the workers great opportunities; a good salary, accommodation and food. The Cats’ objective is to convince them to accept the job through giving false promises; they guarantee regular transportation from and to work and even offer some money in advance to show good faith. The money given in advance, plus all the hidden costs including transportation, uniforms and even their tools are accounted for at inflated prices so the workers are in huge debt to the Cats before they even start work. Once far away from home, with no documents, in debt and watched by armed security guards, the workers find it impossible to end their contracts with their employers.
In 2002, after years of international organizations claiming that slave labor takes place in Brazil, the International Labour Organization sent a paper to the Brazilian government demanding more action against the practice. In 2003, in response to this plea, the Brazilian government created the National Plan to Eradicate Slave Labour, the objective of which being to establish operational strategies to fight the slave traffickers.
As a result of this plan, one of the government’s new actions is to start a program called Zero Hunger that intends to supply free food to areas that are reported to have high numbers of slave labor. Patricia Audi, who runs the national project against slave labor for the International Labour Organization, sees the Zero Hunger project as a step in the right direction, but feels that fundamental changes in the law are needed to end this practice in the country.
Plassat, from the CPT, agrees. “The end of slave labor today in Brazil is directly linked with the end of poverty, not via temporary social assistance to these areas,” he said. “This is helpful, but it is only through new laws that the extreme social difference and discrimination in society will end.”
Another of the national plan’s proposals is to create mobile units to monitor areas where slavery is common. Marcelo Goncalves Campos, who runs the Labour Ministry’s Mobile Surveillance Unit, says that a mobile unit will respond quickly to any claims of slave labor.
Campos says that it is important for slave workers to feel that they can report their employer’s actions after, if not during, employment. (Research carried out by the CPT stated that only 10 percent of slave labor incidents in the state of Para were ever reported in 2003.) “Contemporary slavery is totally different from Colonial slavery, where slaves had no rights to report their condition,” he says.
Plassat believes that reporting slavery requires a complex set of circumstances that, even until recently were very unlikely to happen. “The victims need to be aware that their situation is not normal and it merits being reported to the authorities,” he said. “They need the strength and courage to escape the captivity, take the risk of being captured, punished and taken back to worse conditions than before.”
Ricardo Resende, from the Research group of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, said that a publication produced by the Mobile Surveillance Unit, called the “Dirty List,” names the businesses where slavery was uncovered, and was one of the most important actions taken toward ending slavery in Brazil. By April 2006, 159 names were already on this list. The owners of these establishments are publicly shamed for their actions and other companies have an agreement not to trade with them. The properties on the list also lose any agricultural subsidies from the government.
Even with all these laws in place, the majority of those involved in slavery still challenge the government actions, as only a minority are caught and prosecuted. For example, a journalist for the ONG Reporter Brasil, Leonardo Sakamoto, reported that the owner of one company had 23 slaves freed in November 2001 and another 72 freed in May 2003, but to everyone’s surprise another 201 slave workers were found in March 2005.
Although by law a sentence of 2 to 8 years in prison should be granted to those involved in slavery, Plassat says that none of the 1,500 cases found guilty since 1995 were sentenced to prison: “That’s why the majority of these people go back to commit the same crimes again.”
“Until the sentences and fines are more severe and properly implemented, farmers will take the risk of re-offending, as they know that there is a good chance that they will get away with it,” Resende said. “Also there is the need for more proactive educational work to be done; if an individual doesn’t have education or a job, he is easily recruited.”
Marcelo Goncalves Campos of the Labour Ministry’s Mobile Surveillance Unit says that the best way to end slavery in Brazil would be to have the Congress approve the law that was proposed 12 years ago. This proposed law states that any property in which slave labor is found will be confiscated by the authorities and then donated to poor families who wish some land to work on.
Certain politicians who have the backing of farmers have objected to the proposal, arguing that it would encourage illegal land invasion by people called “sem terras” (without land) to the properties reported to be involved in slavery. Several members of Congress were contacted for their opinion for this article, but none responded.
The end of slavery in Brazil will only be possible when all these laws and projects are implemented, and, more importantly, with better wealth distribution bringing the reduction of social differences and poverty.
To Ricardo Resende, member of the research team at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, the government has taken steps in the right direction to end slavery in Brazil.