COMPLETE INTERVIEW: More from Kevin Bales on slavery

WEBSITE: Free the Slaves

HUMAN TRAFFICKING, PART 1: How, where human trafficking begins

US State Department: Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons

TEXT OF Q & A

KAI RYSSDAL: RYSSDAL: We didn't send Scott to Cambodia by chance. The vast majority of the world's slaves are in Southeast Asia, so it seemed a logical place to start. Kevin Bales is the president of the nonprofit group Free the Slaves.

And Mr. Bales, let me ask you, where does Cambodia rank on the list of offenders?

KEVIN BALES: Well, it's right up there at the top, or you might want to say at the bottom. And it's also in a region that has a whole lot of very significant problems of human trafficking and other kinds of enslavement. And that whole Southeast Asia region is something of a hot spot. They've been doing it for a very long time in Southeast Asia. It's also true that the poverty in, particularly, countries like Laos and Cambodia create a situation of extreme vulnerability. And then you've got rogue governments like that in Burma that are actually enslaving their own citizens.

RYSSDAL: Are human beings, on a relative scale over time, are human beings expensive today?

BALES: Oh, gosh, no. One of the most important things about contemporary forms of slavery has been the absolute collapse in the price of human beings in the last 50 to 60 years. And so it's a very remarkable change in human history.

If you go back to Mississippi in 1850, the average slave, a prime field hand, would cost about $1,200 to $1,500, but those are 1850 dollars, which is about $40,000 in today's money. You could go to Cambodia today and pick up a human being for $100 or less.

RYSSDAL: Does it seem to you that there is more slavery now than ever?

BALES: Well, there are about 27 million people in slavery around the world today. That's a pretty significant jump over the last 50 to 60 years. At the same, while that may be the greatest number of individuals in slavery ever in human history, it's also probably the smallest proportion of the global population to ever be in slavery.

RYSSDAL: You know, merely the fact that you and I are having this conversation and the fact that, you know, the US State Department has published some research on human slavery and the sex trade specifically, it sort of implies that everybody knows about this yet nobody's doing anything about it.

BALES: Well, I think we're just hitting a moment where everyone is beginning to understand that it's around. Four or five years ago the situation was practically the same, but it was literally that no one knew about it. Now we're standing, really, in a doorway. We know the shape of the problem now for the first time probably ever. And we have very good information from the United Nations and the US government. And now we're trying to figure out precisely how to crack this problem.

RYSSDAL: Can you put a dollar amount on slavery and human trafficking?

BALES: Oh, sure we can. Obviously these are rough estimates. My calculations of the productive capacity of enslaved labor globally is around $14 billion a year, which sounds like a lot until you remember that's what Americans spend of bluejeans every year. So it's a lot if you're a criminal and you're able to put most of that in your pocket. But in terms of the global economy, it's a drop in the ocean.

RYSSDAL: Is there an implicit racism here?

BALES: Occasionally. But I have to tell you that slavery today is not about race. Slavery today is very much an equal opportunity exploiter. It's all about vulnerability. Slave holders and slave exploiters really don't care what color you are.

RYSSDAL: I'm trying to think of an analogy here in terms of how to fight this problem, and the one that comes to mind is the war on the drug traffickers. We're not doing so well there, are we?

BALES: No, we're not. But it's also true that slavery is significantly different in some of its very fundamental aspects. There's a lot of reasons why it will be easier to crack the slavery problem as soon as we begin to bring some of the resources like those we bring to the war on drugs to slavery. We're spending billions on the war on drugs. The total US expenditure in the last year on slavery trafficking of all sorts came to a little under $200 million.

RYSSDAL: If, as you say, we are now beginning to cross that threshold where more people know about this problem, what don't we know yet?

BALES: Well, we don't know precisely which strategies are the most effective in each of the different kinds of contexts where slavery exists. You know, we have hereditary debt bondage in northern India, for example, where people are in their fourth, fifth, sixth generation of slavery. That's a very different kind of slavery to a Cambodian woman who's tricked with a promise of a job and ends up in a brothel in Thailand. And we have to figure out the right ways to approach those different kinds of slavery that exist around the world.

RYSSDAL: Kevin Bales is the president of Free the Slaves. Mr. Bales, thanks for your time.

BALES: My pleasure.