Backgrounder

Backgrounder: Trafficking In Persons

Trafficking in persons (TIP) is a crime. Traffickers recruit, harbour or transport people of all ages to exploit them, by making them work in the sex industry or as forced labourers, including in domestic settings. Traffickers maintain control over their victims through threatened or actual force, including fraud, coercion, and sexual assault. TIP may not necessarily involve the crossing of borders, and extensive organized crime networks often play a part.

The clandestine nature of TIP makes it extremely difficult to estimate its true incidence domestically or worldwide, though it is known that women and girls comprise the majority of victims. The United Nations estimates that the total global market value for TIP is $32 billion, next only to the illicit profits generated from drug and firearm trafficking. In 2005, the International Labour Organization (ILO) estimated that at any given time approximately 2.45 million people are in situations of forced labour, including forced sexual exploitation, as a result of TIP. The ILO also estimates that approximately 11 percent of persons trafficked across international borders are trafficked into industrialized countries. It is believed that most trafficked persons in Canada are victims of sexual exploitation.

TIP is often confused with “migrant smuggling” which involves the illegal movement of persons across international borders for profit; smuggled migrants consent to the illegal transaction and are generally free to leave once they reach their final destination. In some cases, however, smuggled migrants can become trafficked persons.

Government of Canada Efforts

The Government of Canada unequivocally condemns this activity and continues to take steps to address it. Consistent with international best practices as reflected in the United Nations’ Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, especially Women and Children, federal anti-trafficking efforts are focussed on the prevention of trafficking, the protection of victims, the prosecution of offenders and collaboration with Canadian and international partners.

The federal Interdepartmental Working Group on Trafficking in Persons (IWGTIP) brings together 16 departments and agencies and serves as the federal coordinating body. It provides a forum for the development of government policy and responses relating to human trafficking and facilitates cooperation and collaboration with key partners including the provinces and territories and other countries. Recent federal efforts include:

• the implementation of measures by Citizenship and Immigration Canada to strengthen Canada's ability to protect foreign national victims of trafficking in Canada by establishing guidelines for a fee-exempt temporary resident permit for 180 days which provides access to health care (including counselling) through the Interim Federal Health Program and application for a concurrent fee-exempt work permit;
• the development of a special tool kit for distribution to all law enforcement agencies which includes a training video, a fact sheet on TIP, a wallet-sized card which provides information on how to identify victims of trafficking and various other information materials;
• the establishment of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police’s Human Trafficking National Coordination Centre;
• support for various prevention and awareness raising efforts at home and abroad, e.g., an education booklet for the public on human trafficking developed by the People’s Law School, an anti-trafficking awareness project in Thailand, Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia undertaken by the International Organization for Migration and research on the needs of victims of human trafficking, to name just a few;
• the preparation of the U.S.- Canada Bi-National Assessment of Trafficking in Persons, which was presented at the 2006 Cross Border Crime Forum;
• the allocation of an additional $6 million per year to strengthen existing federal efforts to combat the sexual exploitation and trafficking of children to enhance current enforcement responses; and,
• the new Women’s Community Fund ($12.3 million) and Women’s Partnership Fund ($3 million) will support community and collaborative projects that address the economic, social and cultural situation of women, with violence against women being one of two priority issues identified for 2007-08.

Moving Forward

As was recently highlighted in the Government’s response to the Standing Committee on the Status of Women’s Report, Turning Outrage into Action to Address Trafficking for the Purpose of Sexual Exploitation in Canada, the Government of Canada will continue to tackle this serious crime through its multi-pronged approach, focusing on prevention, protection, prosecution and partnerships. To view the Government’s response, please see: ( link to FEWO response)

For more information see:

Department of Justice Trafficking in Persons website

http://canada.justice.gc.ca/en/fs/ht/index.html
http://canada.justice.gc.ca/fr/fs/ht/index.html

September 2007