Malawi’s Human Trafficking Routes: Mapping cross-border trafficking points using collective data
Freedom Collaborative and MNAT publish a new report on Malawi’s trafficking routes, Liberty Shared and other organizations identify further mistreatment of palm oil workers, and Chab Dai Cambodia and BDCF highlight an increase in bride trafficking.
Freedom Collaborative and the Malawi Network Against Trafficking (MNAT) are pleased to release a new report on routes and border points used by Malawi victims and migrants.
With 18.6 million inhabitants, Malawi is one of the most densely populated countries in Africa, but also one of the poorest in the world, with the vast majority of its population employed in agricultural work and 40% living in extreme poverty. Many of its people are therefore vulnerable to the risk of trafficking – most are exploited within the country’s own borders, but Malawian sex and labour trafficking victims have been identified in other countries in East and South Africa, as well as in the Gulf region, according to the 2020 Trafficking In Persons report.
MNAT brings together 230 organizations which collectively work to end human trafficking in Malawi and support its victims. However, one key challenge in the country’s anti-trafficking sphere, as noted in the TIP report and highlighted repeatedly by MNAT, is the lack of robust data, not only on victim referrals and prosecutions, but also on movement from, through and out of Malawi, and the source, transit and destination locations of victims.
MNAT believes that effective prevention and response plans need to take population mobility and cross-border dynamics into greater account. However, while the group is increasingly aware of the need for centralized data, it is still working through the myriad challenges such an effort involves – from achieving genuine buy-in from all members to establishing mechanisms for data collection, analysis and application. MNAT’s member organizations have been caring for and working with vulnerable communities for a long time and are therefore an important source of information – yet their knowledge and data have largely not been published or shared.
For this reason, the network has partnered with Freedom Collaborative, aiming to address the scarcity of available data on routes used by Malawi victims and migrants, and to contribute to a better understanding of cross-border smuggling and trafficking trends. In particular, the report provides an overview of the border crossing points used to exit Malawi, and insights into the facilitation of movement from Malawi to South Africa, Zambia and Mozambique. We also discuss reports of corruption and the complicity of officials, which undermine anti-trafficking efforts and allow smugglers and traffickers to easily move people through checkpoints.
MNAT hopes that this initial data collection exercise can help foster a strong data-driven culture in its network members, building a broad interest in data usage to improve programming as a long-term and ongoing undertaking.
We are pleased to invite you to MNAT’s official launch event of the report, which takes place this Thursday from 1.30 pm to 3pm Malawi time (CAT). The online event will include presentations from Liberty Shared, MNAT chairpersons as well as relevant government ministries. You can register for the event here.
Here’s a round-up of other noteworthy news and initiatives:
Liberty Shared, Verité and Tenaganita have raised the alarm over Malaysian palm oil plantations which discourage foreign workers from going home at the end of their contracts and ask them to keep working as the novel coronavirus exacerbates a chronic labour shortage.
The OSCE has published a paper on the establishment of national focal points for child victims of trafficking. It provides an overview of the prerequisites and essential conditions needed for such focal points to foster enhanced information exchange between countries, and an inventory of the tools and procedures they will need to co-ordinate.
A new Congressional Research Service (CRS) report examines trade policy and U.S. government efforts to counter different forms of human trafficking, including banning the importation of goods produced by forced labour into the United States.
Chab Dai Cambodia and Blue Dragon Children’s Foundation say the impact of coronavirus on Cambodia’s garment, hospitality and tourism sectors has fuelled a spike in ‘bride trafficking’ this year: ‘The drastic rise in the number of Cambodians trafficked through Vietnam is a sign of how traffickers are willing to try new routes and new tricks to keep their trade going.’
A new report by Fortify Rights reveals extreme rates of post-traumatic stress, depression, and anxiety among the Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh who survived genocide in Myanmar. There is also a video available of the official launch and panel discussion.
In a new blog post from Global Alliance Against Traffic in Women (GAATW), three women working at a garment factory along the Thai-Burma border share their struggles and triumphs while living away from loved ones amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
Police have arrested seven people on trafficking charges in response to last month’s story by BBC Africa Eye, which exposed a thriving black-market trade in babies in Kenyan capital Nairobi. The BBC’s follow-up feature centers the women on the other side of these illegal deals and aims to understand what drives a mother to sell her child.
The U.S. Department of State’s Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons is hosting an interactive discussion on survivor engagement and leadership, featuring survivor leaders and an ally on Wednesday 16 December 2020 at 9.30am EST. The panel discussion will feature survivor-leaders and an ally of those with lived experience of human trafficking and will focus on themes such as increased economic empowerment of survivors, the importance of mentorship to empower survivors to become leaders, implementing trauma-informed practices (rather than just including survivor voices), and influencing policy.
The Global South Women’s Forum has opened registration for an online event which will provide a structural analysis of the macroeconomic factors that lead to trafficking and labour exploitation, highlighting the recognition of sex work as work as the most effective solution to combating trafficking in the sex industry, and discussing pathways to justice.
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