More on Brazil from Disposable People.
What Needs to Happen for Brazil
“The slavery in the charcoal camps … is just one of the many, many kinds of bondage in the country. Slaves cut down the Amazon rain forests and harvest sugar cane. They mine gold and precious stones or work as prostitutes. The rubber industry relies on slavery, as does cattle and timber.”
“The link that must be forged is between government and business. Purely political or economic attempts to end slavery in the developing world rarely work. … If North American and European governments are going to make a dent in slavery, they must work through tight controls on the businesses that are involved, even indirectly, in the use of slave labor.”
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More on Brazil from Disposable People.
Economics of Charcoal in Brazil
A small batteria can create and haul about $17,000 worth of charcoal in a month. The start-up costs and costs to feed and house workers are low. At this rate the batteria could afford to pay its workers a minimal wage and still turn a profit of 100%. So why don’t they?
It’s important to remember that gatos are simply employees of the real slaveholders. Kept on the edge of poverty and under pressure to make a profit, they are one step away from being slaves themselves. Some gatos who fail to make their quotas do end up working off their debts in the ovens of the batteria.
The pressure on the gatos makes them desperate to squeeze profit anyway they can. So if they can use workers for free, most do. In a tough business with high personal stakes, this is the most effective way for them to get ahead.
The real owners of the batteria and the slaves are able to keep their distance from the abysmal working conditions. They don’t see it; they may not even know about it; it increases their profits. So they have no motivation to do anything about it. Some of the land is still owned by the multinational companies who bought it in the 70s. Some has been sold to Brazilian companies. “These companies insulate themselves from any charge of slavery by arranging the work in a series of subcontracts … If central government inspectors or human rights activists find and publicize the use of slaves, the companies can express horror, dump (temporarily) the guilty gatos, tighten up security to prevent further inspections, and go on as before.”
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More on Brazil from Disposable People.
Life in a Brazilian Batteria
The camps are called batterias because they center on a battery of charcoal-making ovens (usually 20–100 ovens and 8–40 workers). “The heat, smoke, and desolation of the batteria make it seem like a little bit of hell brought to the forest.” Charcoal ovens are dome-shaped about 7 feet high and 10 feet wide, with a 4-foot doorway on the side. The ovens must be pack precisely, be sealed properly, and burn at a specific temperature to make the charcoal. Workers pack the ovens with wood from the decimated forest; they constantly monitor the over as it burns for two days; then go inside the ovens to remove the charcoal.
The climate is naturally hot and humid—this is exacerbated by deforestation. Add blazing ovens, and the heat becomes unthinkable. Then ask exhausted, emaciated workers to climb into the ovens before they’re cool. Kevin Bales describes going into an oven with one of the workers: “The pressure of the heat had my head swimming in minutes, sweat drenched by clothes, and the floor of hot coals burned my feet through heavy boots.”
To combat the heat, most workers enter the ovens wearing very little, but this makes the even more likely to face severe burns. On top of exhaustion and starvation, the workers are constantly on the brink of heat stroke and dehydration. They’re constantly coughing from the soot, and most will suffer from black lung disease, if they live that long. (more…)
More on Brazil from Disposable People.
Charcoal and Modern Slavery in Brazil
Modern slavery in Brazil began with a corrupt government scheme in the 1970s. Its origins and exact means are convoluted and somewhat unknown. Essentially, Brazil gave multinational companies rock-bottom prices for huge tracts of forest. If the companies (such as Nestle and Volkswagen) cleared the land, planted Eucalyptus trees, and then fed those tree to the government’s yet-to-be-built paper mill, the corporations could deduct the cost of clearing and planting the land from their taxes. However, the government never came through: the paper mill was never built, so the multinational companies began to contract their land to local companies to make charcoal.
The industrial boom in Brazil’s cities depends on charcoal to produce steel for cars, furniture, and other products. Once the areas near the cities were stripped of their capacity to make charcoal, work expanded to the region of Mato Grosso, far from the coast and the cities, to turn those native and corporation-planted eucalyptus forests into charcoal. (more…)
Here’s more from Disposable People by Kevin Bales. This section was about Brazil. I’m going to post it in several sections over the next few days. At the end of part four there are a specific things to pray for about human trafficking in Brazil.
The rise of modern slavery in Brazil has coincided with the destruction of the rainforest. Just like a natural disaster can cause destruction and disease in a city, “environmental destruction and economic disaster can cause an existing society to collapse—and the disease of slavery can grow up in the wreckage.”
As ecosystem are uprooted people are displaced. Those displaced workers have no means to support themselves. Some stay, some head to cities. Those in the cities join the already large ranks of the urban unemployed, creating a ripe crop of people vulnerable to being enslaved.
These people, most of whom used to live in and off the forest, are now taken captive to destroy it. This type of slavery is temporary: Once the land is stripped the people are discarded—often far from home and with no resources. (more…)
It would seem that human trafficking is a fairly cut and dry issues. Every government has laws against it. Most people, at least in our society, agree that slavery is wrong. This article about trafficking concerns in Northern Kentucky brings up some of the issues that make human trafficking a complicated issue.
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It’s nearly 10 days until the launch of our boutique! Sign up for our email newsletter before June 13th and you’ll receive a discount code for 10% off. Tell your friends and help us spread the word. We are getting excited!
Sometimes we get so bogged down in the bad news. Our motivation gets sapped and we become paralyzed, but our inaction affects the lives of enslaved people aroung the world. Although the good news is sparse, it’s there if you seek it out. So here are some positives stories I’ve seen lately. Let them invigorate and inspire you.
- Here’s the story of a rescued woman named Kunthy from IJM’s website. She was drugged, violated, and trafficked at age 14. She was rescued during an IJM raid. Here’s the best part:
“In aftercare, Kunthy also discovered that she had something to offer other girls like her: Hope. After several years healing, Kunthy began to mentor other victims as they took their first steps toward a new life.”
- Here’s a bakery in Vancouver that’s fundraising for the Salvation Army’s campaign against human trafficking. Buy a “Sparkle of Hope” cupcake or a “Truth isn’t sexy” t-shirt and 100% of the money goes to the cause. What I love about this (other than the frosting) is that these bakers are taking what they already know and love and using it to help. What do you know and love? How can you use it for good?
