Monitoring press freedom and international affairs from Mid-Missouri Public Radio and the Missouri School of Journalism

Slave labor mars Thai seafood industry

28 April 2016
Foreign fishermen sit on their boats docked at the compound of Pusaka Benjina Resources fishing company in Benjina, Aru Islands, Indonesia, April 1, 2015. (AP Photo/Dita Alangkara)

Thailand is the world's third-largest exporter of seafood, shipping shrimp, tuna and other fish to supermarket chains and pet food companies in the U.S. and Europe.

But a series of investigations by the Associated Press and other news agencies have highlighted a pervasive problem in the Thai fishing industry: the use of slave labor from people tricked or kidnapped into working at sea.

On this edition of Global Journalist, a look at slavery at sea in Southeast Asia, and what’s being done to fight it.

Our guests this week:

  • Margie Mason, the Asia regional writer for the Associated Press.
  • Matthew Smith, executive director of Fortify Rights, a human rights organization working in Southeast Asia.
  • Lisa Rende Taylor, executive director of the Issara Institute, a non-government organization aimed at stopping human trafficking.
  • Hoa Nguyen, an international consultant who has worked previously with the UN and other agencies on human trafficking issues.

Monitoring press freedom and international affairs from Mid-Missouri Public Radio and the Missouri School of Journalism.
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