During the 2023 harvest, the Turkmen government stopped forcing teachers and doctors to contribute, however, other state employees are still affected by the forced labour in the cotton harvesting. This was revealed in a report by Cotton Campaign, who believes it is crucial that civil society, governments and international organisations increase the pressure on Turkmenistan, as state imposed forced labour remains widespread and systematic in the annual harvest.
Cotton Campaign also recently called on Uzbekistan‘s government to allow independent monitoring of their cotton harvesting process, which has also been subject to state-imposed forced labour. While Uzbekistan has agreed to be monitored, the Cotton Campaign claims that people who were sent to monitor the situation were intimidated and threatened.
To increase the pressure on states applying forced labour in the cotton harvesting process it would be good to increase bans of cotton harvested with forced labour, as is already done by the U.S., who have banned cotton products from Turkmenistan.