South & Southeast Asia

The Scale of Trafficking in South & Southeast Asia

South and Southeast Asia contain more victims of modern slavery than any other region on Earth. The ILO and Walk Free Foundation estimate that the Asia-Pacific region accounts for approximately 29.3 million of the world’s 49.6 million people living in modern slavery ; nearly 60% of the global total. The forms of exploitation are extraordinarily diverse: bonded labor in brick kilns and agriculture, forced labor on fishing vessels, child domestic servitude, commercial sexual exploitation, forced marriage, organ trafficking, and ; increasingly ; online sexual exploitation of children.

The region’s trafficking landscape is shaped by extreme poverty, rapid industrialization, weak labor protections, porous borders, and deeply rooted systems of caste, debt, and social hierarchy that normalize exploitation. Many of the world’s most important supply chains, seafood, garments, electronics, agriculture, depend on labor from this region, and trafficking is embedded within them.

India: Bonded Labor & Systemic Exploitation

India has more people living in modern slavery than any other country in the world. The Global Slavery Index estimates that over 11 million people are in conditions of modern slavery in India, including approximately 8 million in bonded labor; a system in which workers are trapped by debts owed to employers, landlords, or labor recruiters. Bonded labor has been illegal in India since the passage of the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act of 1976, yet it remains endemic across the country.

Brick Kilns

India’s brick kiln industry, the second largest in the world, producing an estimated 250 billion bricks annually, is one of the most significant sites of bonded labor. An estimated 10–23 million workers labor in India’s brick kilns, with a significant proportion working under debt bondage. Families are recruited from impoverished rural areas by labor brokers (sardars or jamadars) who offer cash advances. Once at the kiln, workers find that deductions for housing, food, and other expenses consume their earnings, trapping them in cycles of debt that can persist across generations.

Working conditions in brick kilns are brutal. Workers, including children, labor 14–16 hours per day, seven days per week, in extreme heat, carrying heavy loads, and breathing brick dust that causes chronic respiratory disease. Children are involved at every stage of production, from molding wet bricks to carrying fired bricks on their heads.

Tea Plantations

India’s tea industry, particularly in Assam and West Bengal, has been documented as a site of labor trafficking and extreme exploitation. Workers on tea plantations, many of whom are descendants of laborers brought to Assam during British colonial rule, live in estate-owned housing, are paid wages below the minimum, and have limited ability to leave. The BBC and other outlets have documented conditions on plantations supplying major global tea brands, finding workers earning as little as $2 per day, living in dilapidated housing, and suffering from malnutrition and preventable diseases.

Domestic Servitude

An estimated 4.2 million domestic workers in India are children, according to ILO estimates. Child domestic workers, overwhelmingly girls from lower-caste and tribal communities, are trafficked from rural areas to urban households, where they work without contracts, protection, or access to education. Cases of severe physical and sexual abuse of child domestic workers are regularly reported in Indian media, though prosecution remains rare.

Caste & Trafficking

India’s caste system profoundly shapes trafficking patterns. Dalits (“untouchables”) and Adivasi (indigenous tribal communities) are disproportionately represented among trafficking victims. The intersection of caste discrimination, landlessness, and extreme poverty creates conditions of structural vulnerability that traffickers exploit systematically. Bonded labor in India is overwhelmingly concentrated among Dalit and Adivasi communities, and the intergenerational nature of debt bondage means that caste-based exploitation is self-perpetuating. Despite constitutional protections and anti-discrimination legislation, enforcement remains weak, particularly in rural areas where caste hierarchies are most entrenched.

India’s Red Light Districts

India’s commercial sex industry is among the largest in the world. Kamathipura in Mumbai and Sonagachi in Kolkata are two of Asia’s largest red-light districts, and both have been extensively documented as sites where trafficking victims, including minors, are exploited. Women and girls trafficked from Nepal, Bangladesh, and India’s own rural areas are sold to brothels, where they are held in debt bondage and forced to receive clients. While India’s Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act criminalizes commercial exploitation, enforcement has been criticized as focusing on the arrest of sex workers rather than the prosecution of traffickers and buyers.

Thailand: The Fishing Industry & Ghost Fleets

Thailand’s fishing industry, the third largest seafood exporter in the world, has been one of the most extensively documented sites of forced labor in the global economy. For decades, Thai fishing vessels operating in international waters have relied on trafficked labor, with workers from Myanmar, Cambodia, and Laos held in conditions of slavery on boats that sometimes remained at sea for months or years without docking.

The Associated Press’s Pulitzer Prize-winning “Seafood from Slaves” investigation, published in 2015, exposed the scale of forced labor in Thailand’s fishing fleet. AP reporters tracked seafood harvested by enslaved workers from remote Indonesian islands through Thai processing plants and into the supply chains of major American retailers and pet food manufacturers. The investigation led to the rescue of more than 2,000 trapped fishermen and prompted a cascade of reforms.

Conditions at Sea

Workers on Thai fishing vessels described conditions of extreme exploitation: 20-hour shifts with little rest, physical beatings by captains, food and water deprivation as punishment, and murder of workers who were too sick to work or who attempted to escape. Some workers reported seeing fellow crew members killed and thrown overboard. Because “ghost fleet” vessels operated far from shore and transferred their catch to refrigerated cargo ships at sea, workers could be held captive for years without touching land.

Reforms & Ongoing Challenges

Following international pressure, including the EU issuing a “yellow card” warning under its illegal fishing regulations, Thailand implemented significant reforms. These included new vessel monitoring requirements, port inspections, registration of migrant workers, and the establishment of a Command Center for Combating Illegal Fishing (CCCIF). The EU lifted its yellow card in 2019, and the U.S. TIP Report upgraded Thailand from Tier 3 in subsequent years. However, labor rights organizations continue to document forced labor on Thai fishing vessels, noting that reforms have been unevenly enforced and that the fundamental economic incentives driving exploitation remain.

Cambodia: Brick Kilns & Sex Tourism

Cambodia is both a source and destination country for trafficking, with two forms of exploitation drawing particular international attention: forced labor in brick kilns and child sex tourism.

Brick Kilns

Cambodia’s brick kiln industry, concentrated on the outskirts of Phnom Penh, relies heavily on bonded labor. Families take advances from kiln owners and find themselves unable to repay debts that grow with interest and deductions. Workers, including children, labor in extreme heat, carrying heavy loads of wet and fired bricks, and sleeping in makeshift shelters on the kiln premises. LICADHO, a Cambodian human rights organization, has documented that many kiln workers are effectively owned by their employers, unable to leave until debts are repaid.

Sex Tourism

Cambodia was historically one of the most significant destinations for child sex tourism in Southeast Asia. In the early 2000s, the widespread availability of children for sexual exploitation in Cambodia attracted predators from across the globe. Tourist areas such as Siem Reap and Phnom Penh’s riverside district became known internationally as destinations for child sexual exploitation, prompting a concerted response from international law enforcement and NGOs including APLE Cambodia and World Vision.

While the Cambodian government, with support from international organizations and foreign law enforcement agencies, has made measurable progress in combating sex tourism, the exploitation of children continues, though it has become less visible and more internet-facilitated. Foreign perpetrators have been prosecuted under both Cambodian law and the extraterritorial jurisdiction of their home countries, including the United States, Australia, and the United Kingdom. Cambodia’s experience demonstrates both the possibility and the limitations of international cooperation in combating child exploitation.

Philippines: Online Sexual Exploitation of Children

The Philippines has emerged as the global epicenter of online sexual exploitation of children (OSEC), a form of trafficking in which children are sexually abused on live-streaming platforms while paying viewers, often located in Western countries, direct the abuse in real time. The crime is facilitated by the convergence of widespread English fluency, cheap internet access, extreme poverty, and high broadband penetration.

The scale of OSEC in the Philippines is staggering. The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) reported that CyberTipline reports related to the Philippines increased from approximately 23,000 in 2013 to over 2.5 million by 2022. UNICEF and the Philippine government estimate that hundreds of thousands of Filipino children have been victimized.

What distinguishes OSEC from other forms of child exploitation is that the traffickers are frequently the children’s own family members; parents, aunts, uncles, and older siblings who facilitate the abuse in exchange for payments sent via wire transfer or digital payment platforms. International Justice Mission (IJM), which has partnered with Philippine law enforcement on hundreds of OSEC cases, reports that in the majority of cases, a parent or close relative is the facilitator.

The Philippines passed the Anti-Online Sexual Abuse or Exploitation of Children (OSAEC) Act in 2022, strengthening the legal framework for prosecution. Joint operations between Philippine law enforcement, the FBI, Australian Federal Police, and the UK National Crime Agency have led to hundreds of arrests and the rescue of thousands of children.

The COVID-19 pandemic dramatically worsened the OSEC crisis in the Philippines. School closures, economic devastation, and increased internet usage created conditions in which both the supply of vulnerable children and the demand from remote abusers surged. Philippine authorities reported significant increases in OSEC reports during the pandemic period, with the National Bureau of Investigation conducting more OSEC operations in 2020–2021 than in any previous period.

Myanmar: Bride Trafficking & Conflict

Myanmar is a significant source country for trafficking, with exploitation driven by decades of military rule, ethnic conflict, and extreme poverty. Two patterns of trafficking are particularly notable: the trafficking of Kachin and Shan women to China as “brides,” and the exploitation of refugees and displaced persons following the 2021 military coup. (See also Conflict & Trafficking.)

China Bride Trafficking

China’s gender imbalance, a consequence of decades of the one-child policy and cultural preference for sons, has created demand for foreign brides. Women and girls from Myanmar’s Kachin and northern Shan states, displaced by conflict, are recruited by traffickers with promises of employment in China. Upon crossing the border, they are sold as brides to Chinese men, often in remote rural areas. Human Rights Watch documented that victims are frequently confined, raped, and forced to bear children before any possibility of escape.

Post-Coup Trafficking

The February 2021 military coup in Myanmar has dramatically worsened trafficking conditions. The collapse of the economy, displacement of millions, and breakdown of law enforcement and social services have created conditions in which trafficking networks thrive. Reports of forced labor, forced recruitment by both the military junta and resistance forces, and trafficking of refugees to Thailand, Malaysia, and China have increased sharply.

The Myanmar military (“Tatmadaw”) itself engages in trafficking. The UN has documented the military’s forced conscription of civilians, including children, for porter service, construction, and frontline combat. The military’s conscription law, activated in 2024, further expanded forced recruitment. Ethnic armed organizations fighting the junta have also been accused of recruiting children and coercing civilian labor, though generally on a smaller scale.

Vietnam: UK Cannabis Farms & Nail Salons

Vietnamese trafficking to the United Kingdom represents one of the most extensively documented transnational trafficking corridors in the world. Vietnamese nationals, including significant numbers of children, are trafficked to the UK to work in cannabis cultivation, nail salons, and other settings.

Cannabis Farms

Vietnamese nationals, including unaccompanied minors, are trafficked to the UK to tend cannabis farms in residential properties. Victims are confined in houses converted to growing operations, responsible for watering, trimming, and harvesting cannabis plants under dangerous conditions that include exposure to toxic chemicals, electrocution risks from rewired electrical systems, and the constant threat of violence from their controllers. When police raid these farms, victims are frequently arrested and prosecuted rather than identified as trafficking victims; a pattern that has drawn sharp criticism from anti-trafficking organizations.

Nail Salons

The UK nail salon industry has been identified as a significant site of Vietnamese labor trafficking. Workers are brought to the UK through smuggling networks, incurring debts of £20,000–40,000 that must be repaid through labor. They work long hours for little or no pay, are housed in overcrowded conditions, and face threats of violence against themselves or their families in Vietnam if they attempt to leave or seek help.

Bangladesh: The Garment Industry

Bangladesh is the world’s second-largest garment exporter, with the Ready-Made Garment (RMG) sector employing over four million workers; approximately 80% of whom are women. While the garment industry has lifted millions out of extreme poverty, it is also associated with severe labor rights violations that, in some cases, meet international definitions of forced labor.

The 2013 Rana Plaza collapse, which killed 1,134 garment workers and injured over 2,500, exposed the dangerous conditions in which many Bangladeshi garment workers labor. Workers in the factory had reported cracks in the building the day before the collapse but were ordered to return to work under threat of losing their wages. The disaster prompted the Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh and the Alliance for Bangladesh Worker Safety, which have improved conditions in inspected factories but leave thousands of sub-contracting facilities unmonitored.

Beyond the garment sector, Bangladesh is a significant source country for trafficking to the Middle East and Southeast Asia. Bangladeshi migrant workers are recruited for construction, domestic work, and other labor in Gulf states, frequently encountering conditions of forced labor upon arrival. Trafficking of Rohingya refugees, who have fled persecution in Myanmar to refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar, is an acute and growing concern, with victims trafficked for labor and sexual exploitation across the region.

Nepal: The India Trafficking Route

Nepal is a major source country for trafficking, with the open border between Nepal and India serving as one of the world’s most active trafficking corridors. An estimated 7,000–15,000 Nepali women and girls are trafficked to India annually, primarily for sexual exploitation in brothels in Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, and other major cities. The 1,758-kilometer open border, which allows free movement of citizens without passport controls, makes interception extremely difficult.

Nepali trafficking victims are also sent to the Middle East, Malaysia, and other destinations for domestic and labor exploitation. Following the 2015 earthquake, which displaced millions and destroyed livelihoods, trafficking from Nepal spiked as desperate families became more vulnerable to recruiter promises. Anti-trafficking organizations reported significant increases in interceptions at the India-Nepal border in the months following the disaster.

Internal trafficking within Nepal is also significant, with girls from rural hill districts trafficked to Kathmandu’s entertainment and hospitality sectors, including dance bars and massage parlors that serve as fronts for sexual exploitation.

Nepal’s trafficking problem is compounded by deeply entrenched cultural practices. The kamlari system, under which girls from the Tharu ethnic community were bonded as domestic servants to landlords, was legally abolished in 2013 following sustained advocacy, but continues informally in some areas. Similarly, the deuki practice, in which girls are dedicated to Hindu temples and subsequently forced into sexual exploitation, persists in western Nepal despite being illegal.

Cyber-Scam Compounds

A rapidly emerging trafficking phenomenon across Southeast Asia involves “scam compounds” or “scam centers”; large-scale criminal operations where trafficked workers are forced to conduct online fraud. Located primarily in Myanmar, Cambodia, and Laos, these compounds have proliferated since 2020, exploiting the chaos of the COVID-19 pandemic and the post-coup instability in Myanmar.

Victims are recruited through social media and job listing platforms with promises of legitimate employment in technology, customer service, or cryptocurrency companies. Upon arrival, their passports are confiscated, and they are forced to conduct romance scams, pig butchering (cryptocurrency investment fraud), and other online crimes. Workers who resist or fail to meet revenue targets are subjected to beatings, electric shocks, food deprivation, and in some cases, sold to other compounds. The UN estimates that over 120,000 people are trapped in scam compounds in Myanmar and approximately 100,000 in Cambodia.

The scale of revenue generated by these operations is enormous; the UN Office on Drugs and Crime estimates that scam operations in Southeast Asia generate billions of dollars annually. Victims come from across Asia, but increasingly from Africa, Latin America, and even Europe, lured by advertisements for high-paying jobs in Southeast Asia. The compounds are often located in special economic zones or areas controlled by ethnic armed organizations, beyond the reach of national law enforcement.

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