A landowner in Brazil was charged with employing slave labour on his farm and was made to pay workers US$157,000 in back wages.

Odilon Ferreira Garcia forced 171 people to work on his tomato farm in "conditions akin to slavery", the Ministry of Labour said. They were freed at the end of September in a raid by the government's mobile inspection unit.

The workers were held as bonded labour, forced to work to pay off debts Garcia claimed they owed for food and supplies purchased at his store.

The inspection unit found over 500 promissory notes detailing workers' debts, many without their signatures.

Thousands of people are enslaved as bonded labour in Brazil, forced to work under the pretext that they owe money for transportation, accommodation and the basic necessities and tools they have had to buy. Since January almost 3,000 forced labourers have been freed in Brazil and over US$1.8 million paid in back wages, the Government said.