Built on Repression: PVC Building Materials’ Reliance on Forced Labor and Environmental Abuses in the Uyghur Region
This report investigates the increased manufacturing of PVC (polyvinyl chloride or vinyl) through state-sponsored labour transfers in China’s Uyghur Region and the routes by which the resulting building materials make their way into international markets.
The Uyghur Region is being used as both a source of cheap labour and cheap coal, and also as a dumping ground for the most hideous of environmental hazards. The abuse of human labour and the environment in the XUAR has significantly reduced the price of manufacturing PVC and thus of manufacturing luxury flooring worldwide. Through these abusive practices, Uyghur forced labour makes its way into our homes, schools, and hospitals, serving as the very literal foundations upon which we work and play. PVC is not alone on these counts. Uyghur forced labour also makes its way into the food we eat, the computers we work on, the toys we play with, the clothes we wear.
This report provides a road map for understanding the violations occurring in the Uyghur Region and for identifying how the products of those abuses pervade supply chains.