Anti-Slavery - Submissions 1999 - Nepal Debt Bondage

United Nations Economic and Social Council Commission on Human Rights Sub-Commission on Prevention of Discrimination and protection of Minorities Working Group on Contemporary Forms of Slavery 24th Session
Geneva, 23 June - 2 July 1999
Report by: Dr Shiva Sharma, General Secretary, Informal Sector Service Centre (INSEC), Kathmandu, Nepal
*Nepal - Debt Bondage within the Kamaiya and Haliya/Haruwa* Systems**
Of a total six million agricultural labourers in Nepal, about two million are waged workers. Half of these waged workers are totally landless. One-sixth of them work as permanent labourers. There is a wide variation in the terms and conditions under which permanent labourers work. Because of rampant poverty and low wages, debt bondage is found within permanent labour relationships, and it operates in the form of i) extraction of excessive hours of work, ii) extraction of labour service from family members, and iii) indebtedness. Sepcifically, bondage exist in two forms of permanent labour relationships, the Haliya/Haruwa system and the Kamaiya system. There are 46,000 labourers under the Kamaiya system and 260,000 in the Haliya/Haruwa system. The Haliya system is practiced in the hill districts of Nepal. The labourers are advanced cash in the region of Rupees 10,000 (US$149, £88) at the beginning of the labour contract, and they continue to work for the same employer until the advance is repaid. Such labourers are required to do all the ploughing work of the employer, and are paid an annual wage for the work. The amount taken as a loan is much larger than the annual wage, and generally beyond the capacity of the labourers to pay back. Thus a debt bondage situation ensues. In the Haruwa system which is in practice in the terai (plain) districts of Nepal, an advance taken at the beginning of the contract is not the norm. labourers do incur debt within the contract period, but such debt is generally paid back within the contract period. It is possible to do so because Haruwa labourers receive a share of the harvest from the plot of land allocated to them as part of the wage payment. Yet, a different element of exploitation is present in the system which causes Haruwa labour to be bonded. That is, the family members (in particular, the wives) must work for the same employer, and are paid a fixed daily wage, which, in peak farming seasons is lower than the market wage rate. Thus, they have to forgo the opportunity of earning higher wages, at least in the peak seasons. The Kamaiya system is well researched, and there is a clear evidence that debt bondage exists within it. As for the Haliya and Haruwa systems, what little research has been done suggests that debt bondage does exist, with wages being systematically depressed and control exercised over family labour. Informal Sector Service Centre (INSEC) has, over the past eight years, conducted two comprehensive research studies in 1992 and 1998 into the Kamaiya system. INSEC has systematically, and successfully, lobbied policy makers, politicians and donors to put the Kamaiya issue at the top of their agenda. The Government has allocated a budget for a programme among Kamaiya in the past four years. International agencies such as the International labour Organization (ILO) have been assisting the government and civil society to work on the Kamaiya problem, and more than half a dozen international Non-Governmental Organizations are now working with Kamaiya. In 1997, INSEC and Anti-Slavery International jointly published a research report on debt bondage, which included the Haliya and Haruwa systems. Subsequently, INSEC has been engaged in further research into these systems. INSEC is determined to take up the challenge using the experience accumulated in dealing with the Kamaiya issue in terms of research, advocacy, lobbying, and action. The Kamaiya system is prevalent in five Mid-West and Far-West terai Districts. There are 26,000 adult male, 15,000 women and 5,000 children working under the system. Kamaiya labourers differ from others working under permanent labour relationships in terms of debt bondage. Saunki (the debt incurred from the employer), binds Kamaiya and deprive them of basic human freedoms, ie, mobility, freedom to choose employer, and to take decisions about their work. Excessive hours, low wages and the requirement of family labourers to work for the same employer, constrain Kamaiya and make their exit from the system impossible. Kamaiya labourers come largely from the Tharu community, an ethnic group indigenous to the area. Traditionally, they used to be landholders. Their traditional rights to land were systematically squeezed when the state began to allow the establishment of legal property rights in the early 1960s. Migrants from the hills, and those with connections to the state machinery, manipulated the provisions for land registration and displaced Tharu from their traditional control of land. Loss of access to land alongside the continuation of exploitative socio-cultural practices forced landless Tharu into a state of dependence on employers for wage work and credit. Illiterate Kamaiya are systematically subjected to the dictates of the employer-landowners who are well-off socially and economically, and in whose favour the state machinery operates. The Kamaiya issue has now been accepted as a national issue of concern, and both the government and non-governmental agencies (NGOs) are presently working to emancipate Kamaiyafrom bondage. There are about a dozen NGOs and INGOs working on the Kamaiya cause. The programmemes are targeted at individual Kamaiya, and there has been no concern to reform the system itself, or to address structural issues germane to the system. The majority of government and NGO interventions prioritise awareness raising and literacy classes. However, the reality is that Kamaiya are so exploited in terms of hours of work, that they do not have time to attend classes. Therefore, the coverage of these programmemes within Kamaiya villages has been limited. Consequently, in spite of Government and NGO efforts in the past seven years, there has been little impact in terms of Kamaiya emancipation. The current approach is focussed on the effects of the system and fails to address the causes that evolve and sustain the system. There has been little effort on the part of NGOs and Government to really address the issues germane to the Haliya and Haruwa systems. Indeed, the plight of labourers in these systems are not fully researched and are less understood. But the available information suggests that bondage does exist through indebtedness and control over family labour. There are seven to eight times more labourers in these systems compared to the number in the Kamaiya system. And unlike Kamaiya labourers, Haliya and Haruwa labourers are found throughout the country. Solutions to the existence of bonded agricultural labour within the Haliya, Haruwa and Kamaiya systems need to be sought in structural issues - land distribution, regulation of working hours and wages, credit availability, and legal provisions to protect the basic rights of the labourers. Such reforms would enable bonded farm labourers to be transformed into free individuals. The following are recommended as appropriate Government actions for maximizing the impact of targeted programmemes. International agencies should motivate and facilitate the Government of Nepal to respond to these recommendations as a matter of urgency. a. Ratify the ILO Forced labour Convention No. 29, and make commensurate legal arrangements to suppress the use of bonded labour, and forced or compulsory labour, within the shortest possible time. b. Define bonded labour for legal and practical purposes, and evolve legal arrangements to penalize employers using bonded labour practices. c. In land redistribution programmes, and employment schemes, give preferential treatment to identified bonded labourers. d. Give preference to labourers in the systems prone to bondage in terms of access to rural and micro-credit schemes targeted to poor and disadvantaged. e. Fix the minimum wage and maximum working hours for agricultural labourers, and create mechanism to enforce them. f. Encourage and facilitate unionization of farm labourers. g. Gradually create social security schemes to encompass all farm labourers.