Child Labour and Debt Bondage: A Reality For âSustainableâ Palm Oil
According to a new report from the Bureau for Workersâ Activities (ACTRAV) at the International Labour Organization (ILO). About 80% of the worldâs poor live in rural areas where they face a myriad of human rights problems which hamper their ability to survive.Problems include inadequate safety at work, low pay, lack of stability and security of work, and excessive working hours, with women and young workers.
Child labor, slavery, low pay and debt peonage are a part of the #palmoil industry â even so-called âsustainableâ palm oil. Fight back with your wallet in the supermarket and #Boycottpalmoil
TweetNew report: #humanrights abuses affect 80% of the worldâs poor, hereâs how we help them #Boycottpalmoil #Boycott4Wildlife
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Report summary and media release originally published by the International Labour Organisation (ILO), June 2022. Read original
The report, Decent work deficits among rural workers is based on 16 cases studies covering 15 countries in Africa, Asia, Central Asia, Europe and Latin America.
The report finds that:
- Chemical exposure poses serious health and other risks to agricultural workers, in particular to children and pregnant and lactating women.
- Women workers are disproportionately represented in the most precarious positions. Female workers also tend to be in low-paying, low skilled jobs, suffer huge gender pay gaps, and are more prone to may workplace harassment and abuse compared to male workers.
- Child labour, forced labour and debt bondage are still a reality. Up to 95 per cent of children engaged in hazardous work are employed in agriculture, notably in the cocoa, palm oil and tobacco sectors. Force labour is also a reality in some sectors and is linked to workersâ multiple dependencies on employers.
- Weak social dialogue and barriers to accessing workerâs organizations. In many sectors trade unions are either non-existent or face major barriers to interacting with other workersâ organizations such as farmersâ groups and cooperatives. Social dialogue and representation for female, informal, casual, seasonal, temporary and self-employed workers, are all areas of particular concern, as is the representation of smallholders.
- Social protection remains a dream. Inadequate social protection is a particular issue for workers in precarious arrangements, including informal, casual, temporary and subcontracted workers and day labourers who form the large majority of workers on agricultural plantations.
The report makes a number of recommendations to
- Strengthening labour administration in rural economies
- Improving the presence and capacity in rural economies of trade unions and other grassroots workersâ organizations
- Formalizing informal enterprises and employment arrangements
- Ratification of and adherence to relevant ILO Conventions and other International Labour Standards
- Integrating rural economic sectors into formal and institutionalized social dialogue processes
- Strengthening crisis preparedness and social protection in the rural economy
- More research and policy analysis for better understanding and response to the needs and expectations of rural workers and their organizations.
Report summary and media release originally published by the International Labour Organisation (ILO), June 2022. Read original
ENDS
Read more about human rights abuses and child slavery in the palm oil industry
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2. Contribute stories: Academics, conservationists, scientists, indigenous rights advocates and animal rights advocates working to expose the corruption of the palm oil industry or to save animals can contribute stories to the website.
Wildlife Artist Juanchi PĂŠrez
Mel Lumby: Dedicated Devotee to Borneoâs Living Beings
Anthropologist and Author Dr Sophie Chao
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How do we stop the worldâs ecosystems from going into a death spiral? A #SteadyState Economy
3. Supermarket sleuthing: Next time youâre in the supermarket, take photos of products containing palm oil. Share these to social media along with the hashtags to call out the greenwashing and ecocide of the brands who use palm oil. You can also take photos of palm oil free products and congratulate brands when they go palm oil free.
twitter.com/CuriousApe4/statusâŚ
twitter.com/PhillDixon1/statusâŚ
twitter.com/mugabe139/status/1âŚ
4. Take to the streets: Get in touch with Palm Oil Detectives to find out more.
5. Donate: Make a one-off or monthly donation to Palm Oil Detectives as a way of saying thank you and to help pay for ongoing running costs of the website and social media campaigns. Donate here
#BoycottPalmOil #Boycott4wildlife #BoycottPalmOil #childLabour #childSlavery #humanRights #HumanRights #hunger #indigenousRights #landRights #landgrabbing #PalmOil #palmoil #poverty #slavery #workersRights #WorkersRights
Workers in rural areas face severe decent work deficits
About 80 per cent of the worldâs poor live in rural areas where they face governance gaps, informality, underdeveloped production systems, limited access to public services and inadequate social protection coverage.International Labour Organization
Indigenous Peoples Fight Climate Change
In the wake of the worst wildfires in living memory in Mexico and Central America in 2024, news outlets were looking for someone to blame. Howler monkeys and many species of parrots perished in the blazes. Slash and burn farming practices by Belizeâs indigenous communities were singled out as a primary cause. Yet this knee-jerk reaction is not evidence based and doesnât take into account forces like corporate landgrabbing for mining and agribusinesses like meat, soy and palm oil.Belizeâs indigenous Maya communities are rebuilding stronger based on the collective notion of seâ komonil: reciprocity, solidarity, traditional knowledge, gender equity, togetherness and community.
In the wake of horrific #wildfires in #Belize and #Mexico caused by #climatechange, #indigenous #Maya are rebuilding using the notion of seâ komonil: reciprocity #community and solidarity. #indigenousrights #landrights #BoycottPalmOil @palmoildetect wp.me/pcFhgU-924
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Share to TwitterWritten by James Stinson, Senior Research Associate and Evaluation Specialist, Young Lives Research Lab, Faculty of Education, York University, Canada and Lee Mcloughlin, PhD student, Global Sociocultural Studies, Florida International University This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Driven by extreme heat and drought, some of the worst wildfires in living memory raged across Mexico and Central America through April and May 2024.
News agencies reported howler monkeys dropping dead from trees, and parrots and other birds falling from the skies.
In Belize, a state of emergency was declared as wildfires burned tens of thousands of hectares of highly bio-diverse forest. Farmers suffered huge losses as fires destroyed crops and homes, and communities across the country suffered from hazardous air quality and hot, sleepless nights. Many risked their lives to fight off the approaching fires.
As the wildfire crisis subsided with rains in June, public attention shifted toward identifying the causes and allocating blame. Many singled out the âslash and burnâ farming practices in Belizeâs Indigenous communities as the primary cause. This simple knee-jerk reaction ignores the underlying causes of the climate crisis, are scientifically unfounded and stoke resentment of Indigenous Peoples.
Young Mayan women. Image source: Wikipedia
Fanning the flames
On June 5, one of Belizeâs major news networks ran a story with the headline âAre Primitive Farming Techniques Responsible for Wildfires?â The story placed blame for Belizeâs wildfires on âslash-and-burn farmingâ, arguing that âthere has to be a shift away from this destructive means of agriculture.âThe story was followed by an op-ed published online asserting that âbecause of the increased amounts of escaped agricultural fires, aided by climate change, global warming and drought, slash and burn has become more of a problem than the solution it once was.â This sentiment was further reinforced by Belizeâs prime minister, who declared that âslash Đ°nd burn has to be something of the past.â
While some of the recent fires in Belize were connected to agricultural burning â and poorly managed fire-clearing practices can have negative air-quality impacts â blaming âslash and burnâ for the wildfire crisis ignores the larger context and conditions that made it possible, namely global warming.
May 2024 was the hottest and driest month in Belizeâs history. This extreme heat is part of a broader global trend, with June 2024 marking the 13th consecutive âhottest month on recordâ globally.
More fundamentally, these statements confuse other forms of slash-and-burn agriculture with the distinct âmilpaâ systems employed by Indigenous people in Belize.
Indigenous knowledge undermined
Throughout Belize, Indigenous Maya farmers commonly practise a form of agriculture referred to as milpa in which fire is used to clear fields and fertilize the soil. Within this system, small areas of forest are chopped down, burned, and planted with maize, beans, squash and other crops. After being cultivated for a year or two, the field is then left fallow and allowed to regenerate back to forest cover while the farmers move on to a new area within a cyclical pattern where areas are reused after a regenerative period.Commonly derided as slash-and-burn farming, milpa has long been perceived as environmentally destructive. This perspective has been perpetuated by long-standing myths and misconceptions that portray the farming practices of non-Europeans, and specifically the use of fire, as wasteful and irrational.
In Belize, this negative view of slash and burn has driven many colonial and post-colonial interventions to modernize Maya farming practices.
Recent research, however, has shown that the lands of Indigenous Peoples around the world have reduced deforestation and degradation rates relative to non-protected areas. The southern Toledo district of Belize, where the majority of Maya communities are located, boasts a forest cover rate of 71 per cent, significantly higher than the national average of 63 per cent.
Further research has found that the species composition of contemporary Mesoamerican forests has been shaped by the agricultural practices of ancient Maya farmers.
In Belize, fire has been found to play a role in promoting ecosystem health and resilience and intermediate levels of forest disturbance caused by milpa can increase species diversity. Well-managed milpa farming can support soil fertility, result in long-term carbon sequestration and enriched woodland vegetation.
Research has also shown that previous studies of deforestation in southern Belize significantly overestimated the rate of deforestation due to milpa agriculture by not accounting for its rotational process.
Many researchers now believe that milpa is a more benign alternative, in terms of environmental effects, than most other permanent farming systems in the humid tropics. Indeed, findings such as these have led to a growing appreciation for the role of Indigenous Peoples in advancing nature-based and life-enhancing climate solutions.
Unfortunately, research in the region has also found that climate change is undermining the ecological sustainability of milpa farming by forcing farmers to abandon traditional practices and adopt counterproductive measures in their struggle to adapt. In some cases, this has resulted in a decrease in the biodiversity and ecological resilience of the milpa system. This issue is compounded by the decreasing participation of young people, resulting in a further generational loss of traditional ecological knowledge.
Together, these issues are serving to alter and undermine a livelihood strategy that has proven sustainable for thousands of years. However, rather than call for Maya farmers to abandon slash and burn, we encourage support for the self-determined efforts of Maya communities to adapt to this changing climate. youtube.com/embed/ok787HRp_gA?⌠A video documenting the Maya response to the 2024 wildfire crisis.
Planting seeds of collaboration
Since winning a groundbreaking land rights claim in 2015, Maya communities in southern Belize have been working to promote an Indigenous future based on principles of reciprocity, solidarity, traditional knowledge, gender equity and, most significantly, seâ komonil, the Maya notion of togetherness and community.Led by a collaboration of Maya leaders and non-governmental organizations, work toward this has included efforts to revitalize traditional institutions and governance systems, as well as the development of an Indigenous Forest Caring Strategy and fire-permitting system. In an effort to encourage and support the participation of youth in this process, Maya leaders have collaborated with the Young Lives Research Lab at York University to develop the Partnership for Youth and Planetary Wellbeing.
Building on previous research with Maya youth, the project has produced innovative youth-led research and education on the impacts of climate change, the importance of food sovereignty, traditional ecological knowledge and the struggle to secure Indigenous land rights in Maya communities. This work has been shared with global policymakers at the United Nations and local audiences in Belize.
Rather than fanning the flames of climate blame, we must work together to revitalize Indigenous knowledge systems and plant seeds of climate collaboration and care.
Written by James Stinson, Senior Research Associate and Evaluation Specialist, Young Lives Research Lab, Faculty of Education, York University, Canada and Lee Mcloughlin, PhD student, Global Sociocultural Studies, Florida International University This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
ENDS
Read more about human rights abuses and child slavery in the palm oil and gold mining industries
SOCFINâs African Empire of Colonial Oppression: Billionaires Profit from Palm Oil and Rubber Exploitation
Investigation by Bloomberg exposes that despite being RSPO members, #SOCFIN plantations in #WestAfrica are the epicentre of #humanrights abuses, sexual coercion, environmental destruction, and #landgrabbing. Operating in #Liberia, #Ghana, #Nigeria, and beyond, SOCFINâsâŚ
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Colonial palm oil and sugarcane causing the loss of West Papuansâ cultural identity. Land grabs force communities from forests, threatening Noken weaving
Family Ties Expose Deforestation and Rights Violations in Indonesian Palm Oil
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West Papuan Indigenous Women Fight Land Seizures
Indigenous Melanesian women in West Papua fight land seizures for palm oil and sugar plantations, protecting their ancestral rights. Join #BoycottPalmOil
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A landmark study published in Global Studies Quarterly in April 2025 has revealed that the rapid expansion of the #palmoil industry in #WestPapua is not only fuelling #deforestation, #ecocide and environmental destruction butâŚLoad more posts
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Take Action in Five Ways
1. Join the #Boycott4Wildlife on social media and subscribe to stay in the loop: Share posts from this website to your own network on Twitter, Mastadon, Instagram, Facebook and Youtube using the hashtags #Boycottpalmoil #Boycott4Wildlife.
Enter your email addressSign Up
Join 3,174 other subscribers
2. Contribute stories: Academics, conservationists, scientists, indigenous rights advocates and animal rights advocates working to expose the corruption of the palm oil industry or to save animals can contribute stories to the website.
Wildlife Artist Juanchi PĂŠrez
Mel Lumby: Dedicated Devotee to Borneoâs Living Beings
Anthropologist and Author Dr Sophie Chao
Health Physician Dr Evan Allen
The Worldâs Most Loved Cup: A Social, Ethical & Environmental History of Coffee by Aviary Doert
How do we stop the worldâs ecosystems from going into a death spiral? A #SteadyState Economy
3. Supermarket sleuthing: Next time youâre in the supermarket, take photos of products containing palm oil. Share these to social media along with the hashtags to call out the greenwashing and ecocide of the brands who use palm oil. You can also take photos of palm oil free products and congratulate brands when they go palm oil free.
twitter.com/CuriousApe4/statusâŚ
twitter.com/PhillDixon1/statusâŚ
twitter.com/mugabe139/status/1âŚ
4. Take to the streets: Get in touch with Palm Oil Detectives to find out more.
5. Donate: Make a one-off or monthly donation to Palm Oil Detectives as a way of saying thank you and to help pay for ongoing running costs of the website and social media campaigns. Donate here
#Belize #BoycottPalmOil #BoycottPalmOil #childLabour #childSlavery #climatechange #community #goldMining #humanRights #hunger #indigenous #IndigenousActivism #indigenousKnowledge #indigenousRights #indigenousrights #landRights #landgrabbing #landrights #Maya #Mexico #PalmOil #poverty #slavery #wildfires
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Indian Rhino in Assam, India by Craig Jones Wildlife Photography
Palm oil plantations at the foothills of Eastern Ghats near Srungavarapukota in Vizianagaram district by Adityamadhav83 on Wikipedia
Food for financial thoughts. Billion Photos/Shutterstock
Okumu community in Nigeria, Credit: Elfredah Kevin-Alerechi, 2023
Iyabo BATU at the Benin Teaching Hospital during her surgery in 2022
Young Mayan women. Image source: Wikipedia
