Human trafficking is something that we all hear about every now and then, but that most of us never give much thought. We’re not well informed on the subject and figure it only happens in third world countries far away from us. Wrong. It happens everywhere, every day. But what is human trafficking?
Human trafficking is the trade in humans for the purpose of mainly forced labour, sexual slavery, or the extraction of organs or tissues. It’s an industry representing an estimated amount of 35 billion dollars annually.

The most well-known form of human trafficking is sexual slavery. Poor girls, often teen moms needing money to support their child, are promised a job abroad. Once they arrive at the foreign country, they are locked up inside throughout the day and forced onto the streets to sell their bodies at night. Their passports are taken from them so they can’t leave the country or find another job, and their lives and families are threatened. The following video is a documentary that shows just how scared girls are to escape and how the industry does everything they can to sabotage them when they build the courage to try:



Another form of human trafficking is forced labour. Take Evelyn Chumbow for example, who became a modern-day slave in the US at the age of 9. Brought to the United States, she was forced into servitude. Evelyn dreamt of becoming an attorney in America, so when she hears of an opportunity to get education there, she packs her belongings and waves her family goodbye.
When arriving in the US, she’s forced to cook, clean, and take care of the children of the woman that brought her there. For seven years, Evelyn worked day and night, constantly living in fear until one day she finally escaped.
She went to university and sent her recruiter to jail. Nowadays she’s an activist against modern day slavery:

“I want the public to understand that human trafficking happens in many forms.
The focus should not always be on sex trafficking and thinking that human trafficking only involves forced sex. Also, I want the public to understand that victims of human trafficking are from all over the world.”

Not all children are being tricked into slavery like Evelyn. There are many extremely poor families all over the world that are so desperate to have money for shelter, food, and clothes that they sell their own children to traffickers. They don’t always end up working for families. Some children end up in factories that sell their products to western companies. This means that your food, clothing or electronic devices might be a product of slavery. If you’re curious to find out what your slavery footprint is? Take a free test: http://slaveryfootprint.org

Unfortunately there’s not a whole lot teenagers like us can do about human trafficking other than knowing where the products we buy come from or volunteering for/donating money to charity. I know that a lot of you might be hesitant to donate money for fear of charities using the money for their own benefits, so I’ve found two reliable organisations in case any of you are interested in helping stop modern-day slavery:

http://madeinafreeworld.com/ghana/
http://www.notforsalecampaign.org/