Observation (CEACR) - adopted 1997, published 86th ILC session (1998)

The Committee notes the observations on the application of the Convention made in October 1997 by the World Confederation of Labour, including a 1997 report by Anti-Slavery International entitled "Enslaved Peoples in the 1990s", which contains in Chapter Three information on debt bondage and on forced labour on "village development" projects of indigenous Dayak villagers in East Kalimantan (Borneo). The Committee also notes that these observations were transmitted to the Government, in November 1997, for any comments it might judge to be appropriate.

The Committee notes the allegations of the trade union that many indigenous and migrant forest communities in Indonesia are being subjected to debt bondage and forced labour as a result of the devastation of the country's forest resources brought about by private sector logging operations and "development" policies espoused by the Indonesian Government and by one of its largest funders, the World Bank.

The trade union's allegations focus on recent events in East Kalimantan, on the island of Borneo, in order to provide a clear understanding of the way in which modern forms of enclosure, dispossession, and pauperism are being carried out in the name of "development".

According to the allegations, a number of indigenous groups, known as Dayaks, have traditionally inhabited the forested regions of Kalimantan. After the Second World War when Indonesia gained independence from the Dutch colonial government, increasing numbers of Indonesian (primarily Javanese) police, military officers, school teachers, and other government officials, moved into the interior regions of Kalimantan. Beginning in the 1970s, entire settlements of logging and mining camp workers, as well as government-sponsored Javanese transmigrants, moved into indigenous lands. Faced with threats made by company personnel backed up by armed forces, tribal peoples had little choice but to resettle themselves on remaining portions of their ancestral lands and hunting grounds.

The allegations indicate that, in the mid-to-late 1980s and early 1990s, deforestation and human rights abuses in East Kalimantan escalated sharply. Not only did commercial logging reach unprecedented heights, but government policies ostensibly aimed at bettering the lot of forest communities and ensuring forest conservation, resulting in increasing destruction and dispossession. According to the trade union's allegations, what can be considered modern forms of slavery were observable throughout the region.

In 1990, as a result of the negative impact of logging concessions on local communities, the Indonesian Government required all concessions to undertake the development of a nearby community under what was known as the HPH Bina Desa programme. If a logging concession was not able to implement a village development project successfully, its licence could be revoked by the Government. However, according to the allegations, what commonly happened was that companies coerced and threatened villagers into forming work groups or farmers' groups. The groups were then ordered to carry out uncompensated labour on what was euphemistically called a "participatory" development project, designed by the logging company without regard for the needs or wishes of the community being "developed". Most of these Bina Desa projects were complete failures, and led to additional environmental destruction and social conflict. Nevertheless, as far as the companies were concerned, they served their purpose, allowing them to secure the renewal of their timber licences.

The allegations state that, in addition, the Ministries of Forestry and Transmigration produced a law by joint decree, requiring all logging concessions to develop Industrial Forest Plantations, known as Hutan Tanaman Industri (or HTI). As set forth in the trade union allegations, an HTI is set up by means of land clearing rather than logging.

The allegations state that, with the destruction of their lands and livelihood, the affected indigenous Dayak peoples are forced to seek employment as temporary workers without contracts on the very Industrial Forest Plantations (HTIs) which have destroyed their ancestral lands. Plantation wages are usually significantly lower than the cost of living. With the destruction of their agroforestry systems and rice fields, indigenous Dayaks are also forced to purchase food instead of growing it. Many HTIs and logging concessions have taken advantage of this fact and have established "company stores" near their base camps. Purchases may be made at the company stores under a voucher system run by company management. Under this system workers are given credit which is based upon the future wages of the Dayak labourers, who often find themselves not only dispossessed from their lands but trapped deeply in debt to the very companies which appropriated their lands and forests.

The allegations indicate that, after the World Bank withdrew funding for Indonesia's transmigration programme as a result of a massive international outcry over the environmental destruction and human rights abuses occurring under it, the Indonesian Ministry of Transmigration requested that the forestry sector fund its programmes. As a result, as part of HTI development, transmigrants (usually impoverished farmers from Java) are shipped out to the wastelands which have been created on deforested and bulldozed indigenous territories and assigned to plantation labour.

The allegations state that, due to the inability of "land cleared" regions to support agricultural and silvicultural activities, as well as the unsuitability of the farming techniques practised by transmigrants for the poor soils of Kalimantan, there is a high rate of failure in these transmigration schemes. In this respect it is not just the indigenous Dayak communities who are affected. Industrial forest plantation transmigration programmes leave the transmigrant labourers themselves trapped and desperate. Under the transmigration programme, impoverished farmers are provided with a boat ticket from Java to a Kalimantan port. They are then taken miles deep into indigenous territories, where often there are no roads other than rough logging roads. After the failure of their food crops, it is very difficult for the transmigrants to leave the regions where they have been placed. Often there is no choice but to engage in plantation labour at wages lower than the cost of living. In addition to plantation labour, transmigrant men often form work gangs under a contractor who sells their labour to the logging concessions. These logging gangs go into the forest for months at a time scouting for timber. Work gangs also comb the forest for valuable products such as rattan, swifts' nests or fragrant gaharu wood. According to the information submitted by the WCL, "the inflated prices of the goods combined with the under-valuing of the forest products brought back by the labour gangs ensure that labourers remain trapped in a cycle of debt and must continually return to the forest in order to collect valuable products so that they are able to pay off the debts they incur on every trip".

According to the allegations, the problem can be illustrated by observing the activities at the PT.K logging concession in East Kalimantan between 1990 and 1994. The logging company PT.K is a branch of one of Indonesia's largest and most well-known forestry conglomerates, considered to be a leader in the industry. The operations of this company, typical of the operations of Indonesian logging concessions throughout the country, have resulted in the destruction of the natural resource base and wider human rights abuses, including the use of forced labour.

The allegations state that, "in order to obtain a renewal of their logging licence, the PT.K company was obliged by law to implement a village development project near its concessions area under the HPH Bina Desa Programme. Local villagers were ordered to form cooperative work groups or farmers' groups to work on development projects designed by the company. When farmers refused, village leaders were bribed and then coerced into helping the company and local police to force villagers to form a work group".

The allegations describe, as another example, a company store set up on a PT.G rubber plantation which had been established on cleared rattan gardens. The company store was set up where labourers could only purchase goods at exorbitant prices using a voucher system. Indigenous workers, having lost their lands and therefore their ability to grow their own food, now use vouchers representing future wages in order to make purchases at the company store. When they make purchases, they are not informed as to the amount of their total debt. The increasing debts are then subtracted from their future wages, turning once independent and relatively well-off farmers into impoverished bonded labourers trapped in an ever-mounting cycle of debt.

The allegations further indicate that the extent to which indigenous peoples as well as transmigrants are vulnerable to debt bondage and forced labour is not widely publicized.

According to the "Indonesia Report on Human Rights Practices for 1996", published by the US Department of State, human rights monitors have expressed concern about the practices of some logging companies that recruit indigenous people for work. The report indicates that, according to Human Rights Watch/Asia, this activity in Irian Jaya has separated these people from their traditional economies. In many cases, these new recruits for development projects are ill-prepared for the modern world, leading to their being forced into debt and then indentured.

The Committee hopes the Government will provide full information on these allegations.

According to the US Department of State report referred to above, there are credible reports of teenage children being forced to work under highly dangerous conditions on fishing platforms off the coast of north-eastern Sumatra. These platforms are miles off shore, with access controlled by the employers, and in many cases the children are virtual prisoners on the platforms and forced to work for up to three months at a time for well below the minimum wage. The report states that, according to knowledgeable sources, hundreds of children may be involved.

The Committee asks the Government to supply complete information in regard to this question.