1000 Chinese Cooks Enslaved in Germany

by Amanda Kloer

categories: Human Trafficking Awareness, Human Trafficking in Asia and the Pacific, Human Trafficking in Europe and the Middle East, International Human Trafficking and Migration, Labor Trafficking and Trade

Published August 19, 2009 @ 12:38PM PT

Modern-day slaves can be found anywhere, doing anything.  This week in Germany, over 1000 of them were found cooking in Chinese takeout restaurants.  They were victims of a human trafficking ring which smuggled Chinese nationals into Germany as "specialty cooks" and then made millions off their labor.

Here's how it worked: Chinese workers interested in coming to Germany to earn money would pay 10,000 Euros for a visa and what they thought was a legitimate contract for work.  Once in Germany, however, their passports were taken and they were thrown into debt bondage, unable to leave until they repaid the massive debt.  They were forced to work 80-90 hours a week cooking in Chinese restaurants all over the country and paid a paultry 3 Euros an hour.  Even though these workers were paid, because they were held in debt bondage and not free to leave, they were slaves in the restaurant industry.

Too often the faces of human trafficking feel far away from us.   We think of the young girl in the brothel in Brazil or the child enslaved in a diplomat's home in Washington DC and think- how could this ever reach to me?  But Chinese takeout reaches millions of people in the U.S. and Europe.  Who doesn't have a favorite dish from the place down the street?  How many of us know the delivery boy or girl by sight, if not by name?  This is one form of trafficking many of us are connected to.

This story comes from Germany, but it could just as easily have happened in the U.S.  One of the reasons human trafficking in restaurants is so hard to find, is that we have only a tiny fraction of the labor inspectors we would need to visit every restaurant once, much less on a regular basis.  Plus, site inspections often focus more on immigration status than labor and human rights issues.  We need more inspectors who are specifically looking for labor exploitation and human trafficking as opposed to immigration status.  If that ever happens, we might find what Germany found.

Bravo to Germany for ending the exploitation of over 1000 people.  I hope the U.S. and other countries can learn from your experience that slaves can be anywhere, even in the kitchen.   

Image from unionleader.com