You have left the new version of The Economist website. Please let us know your thoughts. MANY of India’s “modern slaves” labour in appalling conditions in brick kilns or breaking stones in quarries. Typically they are recruited by agents offering real jobs and then trapped by accepting an advance on earnings, which turns out to be a loan at exorbitant interest that no worker can ever hope to repay. The boss then suggests that the worker bring in his wife and children, and soon the entire family is enslaved. Unpaid debts can be bequeathed from one generation to the next. Despite having been illegal in India for several decades, such practices continue. Corrupt politicians and police, the caste system and an illiterate workforce with few alternative ways to make a living combine to keep millions in bonded labour. Yet there are examples of activists successfully intervening to free such slaves and, crucially, to keep them free. Some are now being studied to find out what works and could be replicated elsewhere.

One notable example is the Society for Human Development and Women’s Empowerment, an NGO that organises rescues from brick kilns near Varanasi, a city in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh. It seeks out victims, teaches them their rights, organises them into support groups and works with government officials both to free bonded labourers and to make sure they get benefits they are entitled to and school places for their children. It also provides training, especially to women, so that they can earn money in other ways. Some freed workers have even been helped to set up their own brick kilns. The Freedom Fund is now piloting a “hotspot” strategy that seeks to show how bonded labour can be eradicated from entire districts by helping the most effective NGOs to work together. Grants of up to $200,000 have been given to 17 NGOs in 27 districts in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, where bonded labour is most prevalent. In the first year, which has just ended, grants of $1.1m freed 2,193 people, of whom 610 can now support themselves without further help.

Nearly 6,000 families were helped to enroll in government benefit programmes, and 5,000 officials were trained to enforce the law and give aid to victims. These efforts, although positive, barely scratch the surface of a huge problem. So the Freedom Fund has recruited the Institute for Development Studies at the University of Sussex and Harvard University’s FXB Centre for Health and Human Rights to study the hotspots to discover what is working and whether it can be scaled up fast. roebuck hoodiesThis will include controlled trials comparing districts in which the NGOs work with similar ones where nothing is being done, and will look at everything from whether freed workers find the alternative work that they need to stay free to whether they actually feel freer and more in control of their own lives. under armour storm hoodie shrink

The first results are due in a few months. : Why the election in Uttar Pradesh is a big deal : Judges uphold the suspension of Donald Trump’s travel... : Should America want a strong dollar? : The world’s biggest gamblers : Ukraine tries to persuade Donald Trump not to give...zamboni hoodie : Somalia elects a new presidentgac hoodies Middle East and Africanikki sixx hoodies : Game of dronesmudhoney hoodie More latest updates » Take our weekly news quiz to stay on top of the headlines Want more from The Economist? Visit The Economist e-store and you’ll find a range of carefully selected products for business and pleasure, Economist books and diaries, and much more

Rethink Canada in Vancouver has helped Canadian Fair Trade Network draw attention to the people around the world working tirelessly in unsafe conditions, by adding their stories to clothing labels. The long labels on a suit jacket, sweater and hoodie carry the tag line “The Label Doesn’t Tell The Whole Story”, and the message: “It’s time for change. Buying fair-trade ensures workers are being compensated fairly and not exposed to unsafe work conditions.”Made in Bangladesh by Joya. Who left school at the age of twelve to help support her two brothers and newly-widowed mother. Her father was killed when a fire ripped through the cotton factory where he worked. Now she works in the building across the street from the burned down factory. A constant reminder of the risk she takes every day. The label doesn’t tell the whole story.Made in Cambodia by Behnly, nine years old. He gets up at 5:00 am every morning to make his way to the garment factory where he works. It will be dark when he arrives and dark when he leaves.

He dresses lightly because the temperature in the room he works reaches 30 degrees. The dust in the room fills his nose and mouth. He will make less than a dollar, for a day spent slowly suffocating. A mask would cost the company ten cents. Made in Sierra Leone by Tejan. The first few times he coughed up blood he hid it from his family. They couldn’t afford medical treatment and he couldn’t risk losing his long-time job at the cotton plantation. When he fell into a seizure one day it could no longer be ignored. The diagnosis was pesticide poisoning. The lack of proper protective clothing has left him with leukemia at the age of 34. He has two daughters. One of them starts work at the factory next year. The Label Doesn’t Tell The Whole Story campaign was developed at Rethink Canada, Vancouver, by creative directors Ian Grais and Chris Staples, art director Leia Rogers, copywriters Danielle Haythorne and Arrabelle Stavroff, studio artist Jonathon Cesar, photographer Clinton Hussey, print producers Cary Emley and Sue Wilkinson, and account manager Albane Rousellot.