Spotlight on Uzbekistan
111
Not all efforts to reform the cotton sector however have proved efficient and often expose uneven
and sometimes arbitrary application.
421
Mechanisms such as hotlines to report instances of forced
labour have been shown to be ineffective because they are not independent of the government and
require complainants to divulge personal information such as name, address, passport number and
place of work. Many victims are therefore naturally reluctant to file complaints for fear of reprisals.
Criminalisation of forced labour only came into force in 2020 for repeat offenders and although
there have been administrative punishments, they were often not made public. In some cases where
perpetrators were held accountable, forced labour continued at the same premises by the same
perpetrator only days later.
422
Because of a lack of transparency in how investigations are handled, it
appears that those held accountable are not actually the ones giving orders to forcibly recruit cotton
pickers. Where doctors and teachers were found guilty of using forced labour, no-one investigated
further as to why people with no connection to the cotton sector would be motivated to lose their
staff to picking cotton.
Uzbek Forum’s latest report on the 2019 harvest found that forced labour remained widespread,
albeit to a far lesser degree than in previous years, a sign that the reform process is indeed taking
hold.
423
However, the ILO’s estimate of 102,000 forced pickers, based on a nationwide telephone
poll, does not appear to reflect the wider patterns of coercion that Uzbek Forum monitors
documented. A lack of effective recruitment systems, for example, mean that local authorities are
still involved in mobilising pickers. Given the power these officials wield over local communities,
such as the disbursement of social benefits, the pressure to follow the call to the fields is difficult to
withstand. As one community leader pointed out, “It’s a good thing that we control their benefits
payments, or we would never be able to find enough pickers to fulfill our recruitment quota.”
424
There is clear evidence of the continued role of the state in cotton production, despite the
privatisation process. In many cases documented by Uzbek Forum monitors during the 2019 harvest,
orders were given to state- and privately-owned enterprises including banks, local administrations
and government agencies to either send employees to the fields or pay for replacement pickers,
leaving many employees short of up to two months’ salary during the harvest. In short, Uzbekistan’s
cotton sector still has red flags all over it (although it is worth remembering that there were a
number of private companies operating in Uzbekistan even while schoolchildren, some as young as
ten, were routinely bussed from school to pick cotton in the blazing sun and exposed to dangerous
chemicals). So despite reforms, the question remains as to why they have not yet led to the
eradication of forced labour.
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