Protecting Children in The Aftermath of COVID-19 - An Analysis of the 2021 TIP Report

This post of one of two in a series prompted by this year’s Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report. This post was written by Carol Smolenski, previous ECPAT-USA Executive Director and current Board Member.

The U.S. State Department’s 2021 Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report comes out after a year in which the COVID-19 pandemic has affected every aspect of life. It extensively covers the many pandemic-related vulnerabilities as important contributing factors for both adults and children. But it should be noted that even before the pandemic, online exploitation of children was expanding exponentially. Online recruitment, sextortion, sharing of child exploitation imagery, and the growth of online sexual exploitation sites for both adults and children have seen explosive growth. It is a global problem that requires global solutions such as, just for a start, regulation for tech companies. We look forward to seeing future reports address this problem in greater detail, and including proposed governmental solutions. 

Expansion of ‘Special Topics’

This year’s report includes several “special topics” that are exactly on point for understanding why children are vulnerable to trafficking. For example, the section called “Navigating the Unique Complexities in Familial Trafficking,” is a brief but important look at a fraught subject. Families can be implicated in child trafficking for social, economic, or cultural reasons. It is especially intractable because it “takes place within family networks and… children… may not realize they are victims.” Familial trafficking often defies discussion because of public disdain for scrutinizing what happens within families. But placing the topic upfront on this report is a major step.

Similarly, the section on LGBTQI+ youth shows why these youth are vulnerable to trafficking, and ECPAT-USA applauds the inclusion of this perspective that is often overlooked and misunderstood. 

While these special topics are treated well in this report, in the future, ECPAT-USA recommends that equal weight be given to the special topic of “demand reduction.” It is disheartening how little attention is paid to the problem of demand here given the outsized role it plays in the trafficking of children, both domestic and international. It is a foundational cause of child trafficking. 

Efforts in the U.S.

The United States country narrative section is quite long and does mention children throughout. But the lack of focused attention on child trafficking here overlaps with a gap ECPAT-USA has observed when the U.S. reports to the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child about its implementation of the Optional Protocol on the Sale of Children, Child Prostitution and Child Pornography. In its periodic reports to the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, the U.S. presents generic information about all its anti-trafficking work which covers children, but it is difficult to discern the actual child-focused work because the data is often not disaggregated. This problem should be corrected not just to identify problem areas but to define interventions that work. 

With that caveat, the U.S. country narrative does have a few items worth noting about child trafficking. First, the report details an increase in obstacles for trafficking victims from other countries looking to immigrate to the U.S., resulting in, for the third year, “increased reports of trafficking victims being afraid to report their cases to government officials, pursue immigration options, or seek services.” Identifying child trafficking victims at the border is difficult, and there are continuing challenges. However, it must be noted that many of these difficulties were exacerbated by the previous administration’s policy of expelling kids at the border, instead of following the hard-fought-for processes to identify child sex trafficking victims that had previously been established. With the current administration having reinstated the protocols others had adopted, we can hope that the situation child sex trafficking victims face at the border will improve. In the context of mass migration around the world, this story is not over and it is crucial that protecting children who have been exploited remains a priority.

On a final note, it is gratifying to read that the U.S. has made a least a few cases against American “sex tourists” - for example, people who travel abroad to exploit children. But the narrative makes no comment on the fact that the U.S. government does not conduct education for its citizens traveling abroad about the issues around and laws against exploiting children in other countries as so many peer countries do. Meanwhile, it does mention that there are countries where Americans are frequently child sex exploiters, including Costa Rica, Haiti, and Mexico. Children not only in the U.S., but across the globe, would be better suited if the U.S. government took a proactive, preventative approach to these issues. 

To read further comments on new terminology used in the 2021 TIP Report, please click here.