As the country that produces the most exports in the world, China's labor practices play a role in the production of many of the common goods that people rely on every day. However, a significant portion of those goods may be produced using slave labor.
"Forced labor in Xinjiang and elsewhere in China not only constitutes a grave human rights transgression, but also taints international supply chains," said Emily de La Bruyère, a co-founder of Horizon Advisory.
In recent hearings and reports, consultant groups, human rights activists, and Chinese expatriates have claimed that slave labor is rife throughout the Xinjiang region of China, a region responsible for the vast majority of the country's cotton, as well as significant amounts of aluminum, coal, petroleum, gold, and electronics.
In fact, the region supplies roughly 9% of the world's aluminum, 20% of all cotton, and 45% of all polysilicon, one of the key components of solar panels. The Center for Strategic & International Studies reports that Xinjiang is the largest exporter of clothing and other textiles.
"The pervasiveness of the issue cannot be understated," founder and executive director of the nonprofit Campaign for Uyghurs Rushan Abbas said of forced labor in Xinjiang.
Abbas and La Bruyère spoke at a virtual hearing for activists, experts, and former detainees held by a Biden Administration task force. The task force was created as a part of the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act which President Joe Biden signed into law in December. That law, which includes a ban on the import of all goods from Xinjiang, is scheduled to go into effect in June.
At this time, it remains unclear just how strictly the Administration will apply the ban. Depending on the interpretation of the law, it may affect just a handful of businesses or a vast swath of U.S. consumer goods. For instance, some businesses have adjusted their supply chain to ensure that Xinjiang produced components are only used in products sold in China or other areas, but that may not be enough to avoid penalties in the U.S.
Under existing law, it is illegal to import products made with slave labor, but it will now be the Xinjiang-located companies' responsibility to prove that slavery did not play a role in the production of their goods.
Prior to its approval, the law was the target of aggressive lobbying by corporations. Since then, trade groups and businesses have stated that they will comply with the law.
Over the past five years, the Chinese government has used anti-terrorism to justify the detention of more than one million Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Hui, and other individuals in Xinjiang, according to the State Department. Abbas said at the hearing that slavery is a "profitable venture" for the Chinese government and that the intended purpose is to reduce the population of these groups.
While the Chinese government says that the widespread use of detention and forced labor is "the lie of the century", its own documentation shows that forced labor is used against minority populations to bring them under tighter control and to strengthen the Chinese economy.