Overlapping crises — from the COVID-19 pandemic to climate change to armed conflicts — have caused "unprecedented disruption to employment and education" and increased extreme poverty, unsafe migration and gender-based violence, leading to a heightened risk of modern slavery, according to the report.The International Labour Organization report defines modern slavery as being "comprised of two principal components — forced labour and forced marriage.
The report found that more than half of all forced labor occurred in upper-middle-income or high-income countries.