Organizations issue a note against threats to tax auditors

Organizations report threats against auditors and request measures against slave labor in the coffee industry

Foto: Maria Anffe / GcomMT

Last Friday (28th), a group of civil society organizations issued a collective note in support of the Brazilian Labor Inspection. The text is a response to the threats suffered by tax auditors that inspect coffee crops in the south of the state of Minas Gerais.

The state of Minas Gerais is the main coffee grower worldwide and also one of the places with the highest incidence of slave labor in the country. In 2023 alone, around 25% of all workers rescued from slave labor in Brazilian territory were in Minas Gerais, half of them in activities related to coffee growing.

Signed by Conectas, ADERE (Articulation of Rural Employees of the State of Minas Gerais), the Business and Human Rights Resource Center and the AJD (Association of Judges for Democracy), the document demands that the Brazilian State adopt the necessary measures to harshly repress these threats and ensure that the Labor Inspectors can fulfill their duties.