Robert Go, Jakarta – The harrowing tale of a Madurese woman who escaped from a brothel in Batam is throwing the spotlight yet again on the thousands of Indonesian women who go for lucrative job offers, but end up as prostitutes.

Ms Nurul Hafifah, 22, had been leading a harsh life, following the death of her parents who were killed by Dayak tribesmen in central Kalimantan two years ago.

So when a calo – or middleman – offered her a job in a factory in Singapore, she jumped at the offer. She forked out over four million rupiah required by the agent to process her papers, and left for Batam, where she thought she would be trained for her new job.

But her nightmare began upon arrival in Batam. She was taken to an entertainment complex featuring a restaurant, a discotheque and numerous private cubicles – and forced to "serve" clients day and night.

She said: "At first I refused to sleep with them, but they withheld food and water from me and I broke down after a week. On average, I slept with eight men a day." The sex was always unprotected, often rough, and sometimes beatings and verbal abuse from clients – mostly Singaporean, Korean and Japanese men – served as foreplay.

Unfortunately, according to Indonesian activists, Ms Nurul is just one of thousands of Indonesian women who have grabbed at lucrative job offers in recent years but ended up sold into prostitution at home and abroad.

The main reason for this situation is the country's struggling economy and harsh living conditions for the majority of its people. Around 40 million people in Indonesia are unemployed.

Mr Wahyu Susilo, who runs the Consortium for Indonesian Migrant Workers Advocacy (Kopbumi), said: "We're seeing more cases like this. People are getting more desperate. Life is more difficult in their home regions, and unscrupulous agents take advantage of this by selling women into prostitution." He estimates that there are as many as 50,000 Indonesian women working in the sex industry in Malaysia alone, most working against their will.

In Batam, a golfing playground by day and a sex haven by night for many foreign men, the government's own statistics suggest there are as many as 20,000 sex workers. The Middle East, and Saudi Arabia in particular, is another destination for agents' cargoes of women, with around 10,000 to 15,000 currently working there. Non-governmental organisations said as many as 10 per cent are aged under 18.

Another contributing factor is the lack of government protection for women. Mr Wahyu said: "The women are under-educated and easily lured by job offers as household maids or factory workers. When in fact they're thrown into the sex industry, they find themselves with little protection from the government." Indonesia does not classify human trafficking as a crime, and other experts suggest government officials may be directly involved in the trade or turn a blind eye to it.

Ms Nurul, as it turns out, could be one of the lucky ones. She fled her brothel after seven months and found refuge with activist groups who are now lobbying the government to address the problem.

She said: "I'm horribly embarrassed by what happened, but I'm willing to tell this story to keep other women from falling into the same trap."