[Stop-traffic] RE: Stop-traffic digest, Vol 1 #1012 - 5 msgs

[v.achilles]

UNESCO Bangkok's Trafficking Statistics Project is conducting an on-going
litterature review and analysis of existing statements on trafficking in
persons. UNESCO's objective is to trace the the source of numbers quoted by
various organizations and to try to ascertain the methodology by which these
numbers were calculated in order to estimate their validity.

Numbers such as the "700,000 people trafficked annually worldwide" have been
quoted repeatedly, with some variations in the concerned target group:
sometimes "people", sometimes "women and children".

UNESCO's research so far identified 2 main documents reporting about the
700,000 trafficked victims.

The Amy O'Neill Richard's report "International Trafficking in Women to the
United States: a contemporary manifestation of slavery and organized
crime.", dated November 1999,
http://www.cia.gov/csi/monograph/women/trafficking.pdf
Nonetheless, government and nongovernmental experts in the field estimate
that
out of the 700,000 to two million women and children who are trafficked
globally each year,
45,000 to 50,000 of those women and children are trafficked to the United
States. (page 3)
This report quotes as a reference the CIA briefing, Global Trafficking in
Women and Children: Assessing the Magnitude" (April 1999)


"Assessment of U.S. activities to combat trafficking in persons", U.S.
Department of Justice, August 2003
http://www.usdoj.gov/crt/crim/wetf/us_assessment.pdf
In 1998, the U.S. Government estimated that 700,000 people are trafficked
annually worldwide and 45,000 to 50,000 people, predominantly women and
children, are trafficked each year into the United States for sexual
exploitation or forced labor. This estimate was a compilation of data from
1997. Since then, the statistic has been cited in a variety of contexts –
including in the TVPA – as a measure of how many victims end up in the
United States every year. The numbers have recently been updated. (page 3)

None of these reports detail the methodology used to evaluate these figures.

To access information on other trafficking statistics, please visit the
UNESCO Trafficking Statistics website:
http://www.unescobkk.org/culture/trafficking.

We encourage agencies and individuals to provide updates (briefs, reports,
information on the source of some data) in their areas of expertise or
comments on the form and the content of this database to
trafficking@unescobkk.org

Vanessa Achilles
UNESCO BAngkok
v.achilles@unescobkk.org
(+66) 2 391 0577 ext 512


Message: 3
From: "Bruce Gellerman" <bgellerman@rcn.com>
To: <stop-traffic@friends-partners.org>
Date: Wed, 21 Jan 2004 13:58:54 -0500
Subject: [Stop-traffic] Trafficking Statistics
Reply-To: stop-traffic@friends-partners.org

I am trying to learn the origin of the fact/figure; "700,000
people are sex trafficked each year"
Does anyone know who originally came up with it and how the
number was derived?
Thanks,

Bruce Gellerman
21 Hall Avenue
Watertown, MA 02472-1226
617.926.3332
bgellerman@rcn.com