Viewpoint: Roger Plant

There are at least two victims of forced labour per 1,000 people

At least 12 million of the world's men, women and children are subjected to work against their will - a modern form of slavery.

Forced labour is mostly exacted by private agents, who use various forms of compulsion to prevent their victims earning a fair wage (or sometimes any wage at all) for the work or service performed.

Modern day slavery usually derives from longstanding problems of poverty and discrimination in agriculture and the informal economy.

There are almost 10 million cases in Asia, over a million in Latin America, over half a million in Africa.

The most vulnerable groups affected are, indigenous peoples in Latin America, caste minorities in Asia and the descendants of slaves in parts of Africa.

Profits of almost $32bn per year are made from human trafficking, at least half in the industrialised countries. So modern forced labour is a global problem, from which almost no country is immune.

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