Now in their late twenties, Sevara* and Aziz* are two of the almost two million children who were subjected to forced labour in the cotton fields of Uzbekistan between the 1990s and 2020.
“The stories I’ve read in the press do not reflect reality. I’ve seen reality.” says Aziz.
For almost three decades, as an expansion of the Soviet legacy, the Uzbek state compelled people, including children, in rural areas to pick cotton to meet state-set quotas. There had been forced labour in the Soviet Union, which worsened when supply chains collapsed after 1991. Formerly the fifth largest producer in the world, until 2020 the Uzbek government ran a repressive cotton monopoly and required local officials, as well as public servants such as teachers, to mobilise citizens to work on the fields. Cotton was procured from farmers at below-market prices and resold globally for a profit largely to the benefit of a small elite.
