With so many products produced by child labor in so many countries, children are particularly vulnerable to being bought and sold as slaves.
Modern slavery, or human trafficking as it’s often referred to, is a huge and worldwide issue. Estimates of the number of slaves worldwide currently range between 12- and 27 million people, more than any other time in human history.
Photo by Jacob Freeze via AlterNet
The US State Department now has an entire division to monitor and combat it. (It’s latest report is here.) The US Congress first designated January 11 Human Trafficking Awareness Day in 2007. On December 30, President Obama declared January, “National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month, culminating in the annual celebration of National Freedom Day on February 1.”
The increasing attention given to human trafficking by the US government reflects an increasing realization that this is not just a problem in underdeveloped lands far away. It’s happening, in many cases, right under our noses here in the US. The State Department’s 2011 report on the problem within the US confesses:
The United States is a source, transit, and destination country for men, women, and children subjected to forced labor, debt bondage, document servitude, and sex trafficking. Trafficking occurs for commercial sexual exploitation in street prostitution, massage parlors, and brothels, and for labor in domestic service, agriculture, manufacturing, janitorial services, hotel services, hospitality industries, construction, health and elder care, and strip club dancing. Vulnerabilities are increasingly found in visa programs for legally documented students and temporary workers who typically fill labor needs in the hospitality, landscaping, construction, food service, and agricultural industries. There are allegations of domestic workers, foreign nationals on A-3 and G-5 visas, subjected to forced labor by foreign diplomatic or consular personnel posted to the United States. Combined federal and state human trafficking information indicates more sex trafficking than labor trafficking investigations and prosecutions, but law enforcement identified a comparatively higher number of labor trafficking victims as such cases uncovered recently have involved more victims. U.S. citizen victims, both adults and children, are predominantly found in sex trafficking; U.S. citizen child victims are often runaways, troubled, and homeless youth. Foreign victims are more often found in labor trafficking than sex trafficking. In 2010, the number of female foreign victims of labor trafficking served through victim services programs increased compared with 2009. The top countries of origin for foreign victims in FY 2010 were Thailand, India, Mexico, Philippines, Haiti, Honduras, El Salvador, and the Dominican Republic.
In the spirit of human trafficking awareness, think about this the next time you stay in a hotel, drive past a truck stop, or apple orchard, or visit an amusement park or a nursing home. (I won’t assume that iCaspar readers are visiting prostitutes, massage parlors, brothels, or strip clubs. But somebody is.) The next time you have chicken for dinner pause to wonder who the people are who are working in the poultry houses behind barbed wire fences. Do you really think they need 15-foot tall barbed wire to keep the chickens from escaping?
Human trafficking is a problem so big it’s hard to know where to start to do something about it. Fortunately, there are a number of resources on the web. Here are just a few:
- Find your slavery footprint, and see how many slaves are working for you. (You’ll be surprised.)
- Check out the Not For Sale Campaign.
- Download and use the Free2Work app for your iPhone or Android, to find out if the product you’re considering buying was made using slave labor.
- If you’re a student, join the Student Abolitionist Movement
- If you’re a health care worker, social service provider or law enforcement officer, learn to identify the signs and how to respond. Rescue and Restore Toolkits are available from the US Dept of Health and Human Services.
- If you’re a teacher (or even if you’re not) check out the curriculum and other resources at Anti-Slavery.
- Check out the awesome resources and get involved with the Abolish Slavery movement.
- Check out all the ways to get involved with Project Futures.
- The Polaris Project has state-by-state resources, information on current human trafficking legislation, and a hotline.
- International Justice Mission has resources for international trafficking as well as domestic (US) legislative action.
- The Dalit Freedom Network will give you a window (and a door) into one of the many specific groups affected by human trafficking in India.
And, stop back here at iCaspar.net later this month to check out a video interview with Kit Ripley, a Baptist missionary working on the front lines of the human trafficking issue in Thailand. Kit works at the New Life Center Foundation with young ethnic minority women throughout the Mekong sub-region who are at risk for, or victims of, human trafficking, forced labor, and sexual abuse.
What will you be doing for human trafficking awareness month? If you’ve been involved in human trafficking prevention or abolition, or helping those who have been rescued from modern slavery, what are your recommendations? I’ve named just a very few resources. What others do you know of and recommend? Please let us all know in the comments. Your links to online resources for human trafficking awareness and prevention are especially welcome on this post.
