Mapping of the cotton supply chain at the community level in Pakistan: A report on selected districts in Punjab and Sindh Provinces

The report presents findings of a mapping study (henceforth referenced as the “mapping exercise” or “the survey”) commissioned to the Worldwide Fund for Nature Pakistan (WWF Pakistan) by the International Labour Organization (ILO). The mapping exercise was funded and implemented under two ILO projects, namely, Promoting fundamental principles and rights at work in the cotton supply chain (funded by the INDITEX company),1 and CLEAR Cotton: Eliminating child labour in the cotton, textile and garment value chains: an integrated approach, funded by the European Union (EU).

More specifically, the scope of this report encompasses:

• The cotton producing community (tier 4), key actors involved in a range of tasks, relationships, practices, and issues (including lack of representation and collective bargaining, forced labour and compulsory labour, child labour, and discrimination in respect of employment);
• The market where seed cotton is traded;
• The ginnery, to the extent that it links with the farm and the market through the sale and purchase of seed cotton; and
• An overview of the working conditions from the perspective of fundamental principles and rights at work, of textile and garment unit workers – mainly in tiers 3, a few in tier 2 and one in tier 1.

Key findings and analyses

The findings from the mapping survey provide an overview of the work of farmers and workers in cotton production, and to a smaller degree of their children, together with information on textile and garment unit workers. The findings from the mapping survey are complemented with data and information from additional quantitative and qualitative sources. The analyses look beyond the numbers as they break down the processes and examine the relationships to better assess whether the work is underpinned by respect for fundamental principles and rights at work at the farm, in the market, the ginning factory and within a diverse set of textile and garment units. It looks at the critical, yet at times equivocal, authoritative multidimensional role of the arthis (commission agents) at the local market and that of the beoparis (intermediaries), at times rescuers, who travel to farms to purchase bundles of seed cotton right at the doorsteps.