How climate change forces farmers into slavery in Cambodia's brick kilns – in pictures

A 10-year old girl helps her parents by carrying fired bricks out of the kiln Photograph: Thomas Cristofoletti/Ruom/2018 Royal Holloway/University of London

Heatwaves and drought have devastated crops in rural Cambodia, forcing many farmers to abandon the fields and take work in the country’s burgeoning brick industry, where they become trapped in debt bondage. Photographer Thomas Cristofoletti visited Cambodia to explore the reality behind research done at Royal Holloway, University of London, that shows farmers struggling with debt are putting their families’ lives at risk to make ‘blood bricks’