Main Topic: Human Trafficking of Women

          Since around 80% of the total number of victims of human trafficking are women, the group agreed to focus on Human Trafficking of Women. The trafficking of women for sexual exploitation is an international, organized, criminal phenomenon that has grave consequences for the safety, welfare and human rights of its victims. Trafficking in women is a criminal phenomenon that violates basic human rights, and totally destroying victims' lives. Countries are affected in various ways. Some see their young women being lured to leave their home country and ending up in the sex industry abroad. Other countries act mainly as transit countries, while several others receive foreign women who become victims of sexual exploitation.
          According to the International Labour Organization, Forced Labour Statistics Factsheet (2007), 43% of human trafficking victims are used for commercial sexual exploitation, of whom 98% are women and girls and 2.45 million people are estimated to be in conditions of forced labour as a result of trafficking. This number is larger than the population of Namibia. According to The Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking Persons, 600,000 – 800,000 men, women and children are trafficked across international borders each year. Approximately 80 percent are women and girls. Up to 50 percent are minors. The most common form of human trafficking (80 percent) is sexual exploitation. The victims of sexual exploitation are predominantly women and girls.

          In the Philippines, women are vulnerable to trafficking due to the Asian economic crisis. Requests for entertainer visas for Japan did not decline in the first six months of 1998. Travel to Japan increased 21% in the first half of this year compared with the same period in 1997. The label "entertainer" sometimes implies "sex worker." The women are vulnerable in Japan, not because they lack skills, but because they are young, beautiful women in a hazardous or vulnerable occupation. Approximately 150,000 Filipina women have been trafficked into prostitution in Japan. In 1996, 492 of 3,776 reported cases of child abuse involved pornography, prostitution, paedophilia and trafficking. There were 8,335 cases of child abuse from 1991-1996, 96% of the victims were females. Trafficking laws exists but are not enforced.  Prostitution and sex trafficking are pervasive in the countryside. According to a study made by various non-governmental organizations led by the Women's Education, Development, Productivity and Research Organization (WEDPRO), even remote rural areas are becoming favorite sites for sex traffickers and prostitution syndicates. Certain areas in Laoag, General Santos City, Negros, Southern Tagalog provinces, Pinatubo area, and Pagadian, to name a few, have reported increasing numbers of cases of prostitution, and where prostituted women are no longer from other provinces, but are local women.

SOURCES:

• Human Trafficking: Worldwide Stats
• Trafficking in women for sexual exploitation
• The Philippines: Trafficking