January Is Human Trafficking Prevention Month

By now, many people have heard of human trafficking and slavery, but I always like to start any conversation about this issue with this fact: there are an estimated 50 million trafficked and enslaved people around the world.

This number is shocking, but even more shocking is that this is a rise of over 10 million people since 2017. The rise in numbers may be for good reasons, like there is more sophistication and efforts in identification, and bad reasons, like more people than ever, are being exploited.

Four P's: Prevention, Prosecution, Protection, and Partnership

In 2021, President Biden's Administration released an “action plan” to combat human trafficking focused on prevention, prosecution, and protection. Though not explicit, the plan emphasizes the importance of partnership as government agencies are making better efforts to work with nonprofit organizations, academic institutions, and tribal authorities. The latter is to especially address the hundreds of cases of missing and murdered indigenous and native women.

In 2021, the bipartisan Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention was signed with overwhelming support. This policy prevents goods made with forced labor in China's Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region from being imported to the US.

This focus on labor trafficking, as well as sex trafficking, is essential as there are actually more instances of labor trafficking in the United States and abroad. The International Labor Organization (ILO) estimates that a little over 22 percent of trafficking is sex trafficking (commercial sexual exploitation). If the definition of sex trafficking were to include all forms of child marriage, forced marriage, mail-order brides, and sex tourism, surely those numbers would explode exponentially.

All of these numbers should be placed against the backdrop that human trafficking is an estimated 150 billion dollar industry. With such an astronomical profit margin, it is easy to understand how traffickers, exploiters, pimps, and other bad actors will defend and ensure the selling of human beings persists. They will fight as hard as those that do who want to end human trafficking. For this, all of those who are anti-trafficking warriors must be prepared.

10 Things to Know About Human Trafficking

To end human trafficking, more than a month dedicated to it is needed. However, the starting point is the same–to begin understanding the issue. So, let's start at the beginning. As we begin January and Human Trafficking Prevention Month- what is most important to know?

1. Human trafficking is defined as the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring, or receipt of people through force, fraud, or deception, with the aim of exploiting them for profit.
2. Human trafficking affects people of all ages, genders, and nationalities, although women and children are particularly vulnerable.
3. Human trafficking can take many forms, including sex trafficking, labor trafficking, and organ trafficking.
4. The main drivers of human trafficking are the demand for cheap labor, goods, and services and the lack of effective laws and enforcement mechanisms to protect people from exploitation.
5. Human trafficking is often hidden, making it difficult to identify and prosecute traffickers. Victims may be afraid to come forward or may not even realize they are being exploited.
6. There are many indicators that someone may be a victim of human trafficking, including being controlled by someone else, having no identification documents, being in debt, and experiencing physical or sexual abuse.
7. To combat human trafficking, it is important to address the root causes and implement effective prevention and protection measures, as well as to prosecute traffickers and provide support and services to victims.
8. Governments, international organizations, and non-governmental organizations are working to combat human trafficking through legislation, law enforcement, and victim support programs.
9. You can help to combat human trafficking by supporting organizations that work to prevent trafficking, protect victims, and prosecute traffickers, and by being aware of the issue and speaking out against it.
10. If you suspect that someone may be a victim of human trafficking, you should report it to the authorities or to a trusted organization that can help. The number for the National Human Trafficking Hotline is 1-888-373-7888 (or you can text to *233722).