Landmark 50th Ratification of Forced Labour Protocol Brings Us a Step Closer to SDG 8.7
Mr Guy Ryder, ILO Director-General (Photo: Marcel Crozet / ILO)
Last week, Sudan became the 50th country to ratify the ILO’s Forced Labour Protocol (P29), making a long-standing goal of the United Nations Association of New York a reality. With Sudan’s ratification, the ILO’s 50 for Freedom initiative—which UNA-NYC supports through its partnership with Freedom United—has met its initial target, marking a major achievement for the global anti-slavery movement. The world has been brought a step closer to achieving one of the Sustainable Development Goals most central to UNA-NYC’s work: 8.7, to end forced labor and modern slavery.
Guy Ryder, Director-General of the ILO, lauded what he called a major milestone. “A future of work that is free of forced labor, human trafficking, child labor and modern slavery is a future that we must shape together,” Ryder commented. “Because forced labor has no place in the better normal we want to start building as of today.”
Officially the Protocol of 2014 to the Forced Labour Convention, 1930, P29 brings the widely ratified Convention into the present and is considered the current gold standard of international forced labor legislation. Taking into consideration the changes the world has undergone in the decades since the Convention first came into force, the Protocol makes crucial reference to migrants—today among the most vulnerable groups to forced labor—and to the importance of protecting all victims, regardless of their immigration status.
UNA-NYC’s stepped up its efforts against modern slavery in 2019 through a new partnership with Freedom United, which represents the world’s largest anti-slavery community. The partnership has allowed us to bring Freedom United’s campaign for ratification to the UN Headquarters and to the missions of multiple member states—including Costa Rica, which went on to ratify P29 in November 2020. Today we celebrate the achievement of a shared goal.
In a post on their website, Freedom United celebrated the achievement and thanked “100,000+ Freedom United supporters and our partners at United Nations Association of New York, who have kept up the momentum to make the ILO’s 50 for Freedom a reality.”
As Ryder and Freedom United noted, the celebration of this goal must lead to a continued push for the rest of the world’s governments to ratify this crucial treaty. The countries that have already ratified, meanwhile, must focus their efforts on implementing the Protocol effectively.
Learn more about our partnership with Freedom United here.