News & Publications

22 Jun 2012

Revelations of human trafficking in New Zealand – or, in the case of foreign-chartered fishing boats, New Zealand waters – disclosed in the Trafficking in Persons report released on June 20, 2012 by the US State Department should come as no surprise.

As was highlighted in an anti-trafficking conference in Wellington last year, no country is immune whether as a source, transit or destination for human trafficking. Trafficking falls into the category of modern day slavery along with forced labour, debt bondage, some forms of contract labour and child slavery. A widely accepted estimate claims 27 million people are held in slavery today, about twice the number of Africans sold into slavery during the years of the trans-Atlantic slave trade.

Why? Blame poverty, a reluctance by individual governments to enforce labour laws and increasing pressure to ignore unethical practices within the supply chains of commonly traded goods such as chocolate, coffee, cotton, rice, sugar – and fish. In the full and very public glare of the trafficking report New Zealand has to brush up its act.

Are we listening? In 2009 Parliament rejected a bill, prompted by a Trade Aid petition, to ban the import of goods made with slave labour, claiming that existing legislation and voluntary in-house codes are sufficient. Clearly they are not.

Today the New Zealand Government continues to participate in behind-doors negotiations on the planned Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement, a trade deal already widely criticised for allowing foreign investors to sue governments if a law or policy are seen to put their investment at risk.

As New Zealand opens tenders for oil and gas exploration how do we ensure that the successful companies will not allow the erosion of labour rights and conditions in the name of profit and “investment protection”? This is not a problem “over there”. This is on our turf. But there are ways to limit New Zealand’s involvement in such practices.

Trade Aid manages the supply chains of the items it buys – including cocoa, chocolate and coffee – to ensure that no worker is exploited, no childhood cut short, in the production of the goods it sells to New Zealand customers. The Government needs to act, and act quickly, to ensure its laws are robust enough, and enforced enough, to ensure we are not complicit in global and local supply chains tainted by human slavery.