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Original article: Acusan que Chile tolera el trabajo forzado en sectores exportadores de salmón y fruta: Fundación Libera ingresa denuncia ante organismo comercial de EE.UU.

Libera Foundation Files Complaint with U.S. Trade Agency Alleging Chile Tolerates Forced Labor in Salmon and Fruit Export Sectors

The Libera Foundation, dedicated to combating human trafficking and slavery in all its forms, is a member of the Chilean Civil Society Platform on Human Rights and Business. On April 15, they formally submitted comments to the United States Trade Representative (USTR) amidst an ongoing investigation under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974, which assesses whether 60 economies, including Chile, have failed to effectively establish a ban on the importation of goods produced with forced labor.

The submitted document confirms the presence of eleven indicators of forced labor recognized by the International Labour Organization (ILO) within two key export sectors of the Chilean economy: agriculture—particularly the production of blueberries, mandarins, and clementines for export—and the salmon industry.

Workers in Exploitative Conditions

The agricultural sector report documents that the victims are predominantly Venezuelan, Haitian, and Bolivian migrants entering the country in irregular situations. This precarious status compromises their legal regularization to their employment maintenance. Libera outlines systematic deceptive practices in recruitment, isolation on remote farms lacking basic services, restricted movement, wage retention, illegitimate deductions, 10 to 12 hour workdays six days a week without overtime pay, physical violence from contractors, threats of reporting to immigration authorities as control mechanisms, and overcrowded, unsanitary living conditions.

In the salmon industry, Libera, in collaboration with the Ecoceanos Center, has documented 83 verifiable worker deaths between 2013 and 2026, due to substandard and lethal working conditions. These include violations of depth and time limits during diving, lack of emergency air bottles, poor maintenance of compressors, systematic denial of timely transport to hyperbaric chambers in serious accidents, and falsified diving records. Additionally, there are blacklists against workers attempting to file complaints, as well as collusion between salmon companies and insurance mutuals to deny recognition of workplace accidents and occupational illnesses.

A Structural Enforcement Gap

The report identifies three structural factors exacerbating the risk: vertical concentration of ownership in both sectors, subcontracting regimes that function as firewalls for major companies to evade labor responsibilities, and a business culture that, according to the Board Trendings Report 2023—derived from surveys of 369 Chilean company directors—only responds to fear of sanctions as the primary driver for change.

In regulatory terms, Libera warns that Chile has not defined forced labor as an independent crime, only including it as a purpose of human trafficking offenses. The result is that in the fifteen years since the enactment of Law 20.507, an average of just two cases of labor trafficking are formalized per year with the Public Prosecutor’s Office, in a country where the Global Slavery Index estimates that 61,000 people are in modern slavery conditions. Between 2021 and 2023, there were no requests from the Public Prosecutor’s Office to activate inspection procedures to detect forced labor through the Labor Directorate.

The Chilean Government’s Position and International Perspective

The Chilean embassy in Washington also submitted comments to the USTR in the same case, signed by Chargé d’affaires Juan Pablo Espinoza, aiming to position the country favorably in the investigation. The document highlights Chile’s ratification of key ILO conventions on forced labor—including Convention 29 and its 2014 Protocol—its presidency in the Alliance 8.7, the establishment of the Ministerial Advisory Commission for the Eradication of Forced Labor (CAMTRAFOR), and the approval of the first National Action Plan against Forced Labor (PANTRAFOR). In conclusion, the Chilean government states it is evaluating specific mechanisms to implement bans on importing goods produced with forced labor and asserts that neither the government nor Chilean companies engage in conduct that could be deemed unreasonable or discriminatory under Section 301.

However, the regulatory backdrop surrounding Chile is more stringent. The international organization Verité, specialized in supply chain audits and labor compliance, has also submitted comments to the USTR echoing concerns raised in the U.S. Trade Estimates National Report 2026. This report explicitly states that the United States has reservations regarding Chilean legislation on internationally recognized labor rights, particularly concerning freedom of association and collective bargaining, as well as the effective enforcement of labor laws. The report further notes that Chile lacks a ban on the importation of goods produced with forced or compulsory labor, allowing such goods to enter the Chilean market and compete, which could artificially suppress labor costs, giving certain goods and services from Chile an unfair advantage.

Recommendations to the Section 301 Committee

Libera urged the Section 301 Committee to consider seven concrete measures regarding Chile: defining forced labor as an independent crime according to international standards; strengthening sectoral labor legislation in agriculture and aquaculture; adopting a national ban on the importation of goods produced with forced labor, similar to Section 307 of the U.S. Tariff Act; eliminating restrictions on union freedom and collective bargaining; enhancing labor inspection and compliance mechanisms; incorporating binding monitoring and transparency mechanisms in labor chapters of trade agreements; and including civil society organizations and victims in the design and implementation of public policy.

Carolina Rudnick, president of Libera, remarked in a column published in El Mostrador that the USTR investigations have succeeded in situating the concept in public debate and exposing the failings of countries in this regard, cautioning that Chile faces this situation with a weak legal regime, superficial oversight, and a consistent history of serious records of forced labor in key economic sectors. «There will be no security or growth if we allow human beings to coexist under differentiated systems of legal protection. This is an emergency,» she asserted.

The comments are publicly available on the USTR website (https://comments.ustr.gov/s/), and you can access Libera’s report directly here.

La entrada Chile Accused of Tolerating Forced Labor in Salmon and Fruit Export Sectors: Libera Foundation Files Complaint with U.S. Trade Agency se publicó primero en El Ciudadano.