Source: CNN Freedom Project
On April 15, 2014, 300 Nigerian girls were kidnapped while studying for their final exams and sold for $12 each to militant husbands.
Slavery still exists today, and it starts with human trafficking.
In fact, there are more slaves today in 2014 than there ever were during the Atlantic Slave Trade from 1500-1800. During that time, it’s estimated that close to 12 million were transported across the Atlantic to slavery in North and South America. Today, there are 27 million slaves around the world (Source: Free the Slaves).
Modern day slavery is one of the most pressing human rights issues of our time and something people need to be aware of in order to end it.
What is Human Trafficking?
Human trafficking exists in virtually every country in the world, including the US, and is one of the fastest-growing criminal industries. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) defines trafficking in persons as the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring or receipt of persons through the threat or use of force, coercion, abduction, fraud, or deception for the purpose of exploitation. Exploitation is defined as the exploitation of the prostitution of others or other forms of sexual exploitation, forced labor, slavery, servitude, or the removal of organs.
Under the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA), the various types of sex trafficking include “prostitution, pornography, stripping, live-sex shows, mail-order brides, military prostitution, and sex tourism.”
What’s important to note is that, under the US definition of trafficking in persons within the TVPA, the transportation or the physical movement of the victim does not need to happen in order for the crime to occur. It is the presence of exploitation that dictates whether or not the crime has occurred. This means that not only are there foreigners trafficked from Asia, Latin America, and Eastern Europe, to Los Angeles, but there are also Angelenos forced into exploitation in our own backyards.
Human Trafficking Statistics
- Human trafficking is a $32 billion industry (Source: International Labour Office)
- About 1.2 million children are trafficked every year (Source: UNICEF)
- 43% of victims are forced into commercial sexual exploitation, of whom 98% are women or girls (Source: International Labor Organization)
- 14,500 – 17,500 people are trafficked into the US annually (Source: US Dept. of State)
- 244,000 – 325,000 American youth are at risk for sexual exploitation (Estes & Weiner, 2001) 1
- California is one of the top 3 destination states for human trafficking to and within the US 2
- California has 3 of the FBI’s 13 highest child sex trafficking areas in the nation: Los Angeles, San Francisco, and San Diego 3
- The average age for entry into street prostitution in America: 12-14 years old 4
1. Estes, R., & Weiner, N. (2001). The commercial sexual exploitation of children in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania.↩
2. WEAVE, Inc. Facts about Human Trafficking↩
3. US Department of Justice. (2009) The Federal Bureau Investigation’s Efforts to Combat Crimes Against Children↩
4. Shared Hope International. (2009) The National Report on Domestic Minor Sex Trafficking: America’s Prostituted Children↩