Goal: Stop forced labor performed by persecuted minorities on cotton farms.
Over half a million people are forced to pick cotton by hand in southern Xinjiang, China’s westernmost province and home to large populations of Muslim minorities. According to numerous human rights organizations, Uyghurs, Hui, Kazakhs, and other groups in the region have been subjected to extensive abuses, including arbitrary imprisonment and forced labor for over a decade. Reports have surfaced that members of these groups may have been coerced into working on cotton farms as part of so-called “labor transfer programs.” These laborers are held in barracks far from their homes and undergo abusive ideological training to discourage them from practicing their traditional cultures and religion, or “illegal religious activities.”