There are three main areas of focus in fighting human trafficking– prevention, intervention, and after-care.

All three efforts are invaluable to the rescue of the millions of men and women forced into slave labor or the sex industry today. Below you’ll find a brief overview of all three areas, and you’ll see why The Exodus Road focuses specifically on intervention.

PREVENTION

Poverty, a lack of education, few women’s rights, corrupt governments, poor infrastructure, and thriving underground industries are some of the factors that play a role in most cases of human trafficking. Prevention techniques include community empowerment, poverty reduction projects, and educational programs. Providing sexual education, AIDS education, and trafficking awareness are also key prevention strategies. Changing a society’s view of labor, women, sex, and children, working within governments to make new laws, and intentional prayers are also key components here. It is vital that efforts continue to be made in this arena, especially in regards to the increased availability of education to impoverished girls. 

AFTER-CARE

As the final step in the process of rescuing a victim, after-care is an important aspect of the fight against human trafficking. Facilities with special care given to victims are on the rise and hopefully focus on holistic approaches to restoring individuals. Responsible efforts must be made to give counseling, education, life-skills, and job-skills to former victims, empowering them to embrace a better future for themselves. After-care efforts also involve the legal means to restore a victim back into his or her society and culture, particularly if the victim has been trafficked across international borders. This is noble work that demands longevity and commitment from those undertaking it.

INTERVENTION

Intervention is a very difficult aspect of fighting modern day slavery. It is wrought with issues which naturally cause conflict regarding methodology. Working within local police forces can prove challenging because of the high levels of corruption, and the moral dangers of gaining intelligence on brothels and sex establishments is great. It is also expensive work. Investigators can spend hundreds of dollars gathering evidence on a single case, only to have the local police choose a bribe over a raid. There are also costs for training, equipment, and travel for investigators, and since most of the organizations on the ground are grassroots and do not have the funding needed to conduct investigations, its very difficult to hand the local government actionable evidence. In addition, most local police forces and government agencies are also largely understaffed and underfunded. 

Working in counter-trafficking, we have seen intervention as one of the missing links in the area of Asia where we primarily operate. There are very few people actually engaged in the work of gathering and then passing on prosecutable evidence to local authorities. We  understand why, but we also know that unless we throw wrenches in the cogs of the systems which make trafficking such a lucrative illegal business, slavery will continue. We must make human trafficking and the sale of underage girls more difficult, more risky, and more expensive for both the trafficker and the customer.

To learn more about how you can be involved in the rescue of young girls and boys from the sex industry, click on our Get Involved page.

“We walked into the hotel and they told us to wait our turn. After a few minutes in the lobby, they took us up an elevator to the 6th floor of the hotel, and we followed them down the hall. Most of the doors of the rooms were open, and there were European women {prostitutes} waiting in the rooms. What was unbelievable was that this was the sixth floor of a regular, popular tourist hotel in the heart of the city. Open prostitution and potentially human trafficking was happening right there on the floor above where a family of four was staying for vacation.” – Jonah, Undercover Investigator

Two undercover officers who worked in partnership with The Exodus Road were able to take undercover equipment into over 25 brothel/bar establishments where sex was sold. Spending three nights in undercover work, they were able to capture video and positively identify two sixteen year olds. They were also able to visit and gather intelligence on two establishments that featured Eastern European women, a note of interest in trafficking investigations in this particular city.

During the days, they were able to meet with three different organizations in that capital city who are working with trafficked victims and at-risk children. With the idea of creating trusting partnerships among organizations, they shared information with these on-the-ground NGO’s and continued developing workable relationships. They were able to receive a viable tip from one of the individuals they met with, and then were able to follow that lead during one of the evenings out.

After the three nights of investigations, they were able to write an official report on one particular brothel which looked especially suspicious. The field operators were able to turn that report, along with photos of the underage girls and their locations, along to the local anti-trafficking organization in the city.

They are currently following up on those leads.

Interested in funding an investigative mission like this one? Cover part or all of the costs for our investigators to operate, and you’ll receive real updates like this one from the field.

*As always, names, dates, and details are changed to protect our investigators and their work.