We applaud the Province of Canada for their new effort in helping in the global fight against sex trafficking, a $99 billion-dollar industry that robs individuals of their basic human rights.
Canada is one of the top three countries in the world for exploiting children online.
Recent news reports state that more than half of the targets in the human trafficking trade are Canadian born. Most recent data from Statistics Canada shows that 90% of sex trafficking victims are females between the ages of 18 and 24 – sometimes as young as 13.
With some traffickers having made up to $1.6 million per year off their victims’, sexual exploitation/human trafficking show no signs of slowing down and Canada is taking measures into their own hands by proposing a new bill to empower survivors.
Canada just introduced a human trafficking bill that would protect survivors and provide them with rights against their abusers. Currently, there is also a bill pending in US Congress that will amend the Public Health Service Act to provide for the implementation of curricula for training students, teachers, and school personnel to understand, recognize, prevent, and respond to signs of human trafficking and exploitation in children and youth, and for other purposes. If passed by both the US and Canada, this would be one major step forward in eradicating human exploitation and sex trafficking recruitment.
According to Canada’s pending Bill 8, “The Protecting Survivors of Human Trafficking Act” is passed, it will:
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expand the definition of sexual exploitation to include people of all ages
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make it easier for survivors to get protection orders
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enable police to take faster action to rescue survivors
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allow survivors to sue traffickers
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create an awareness day each year on Feb. 22
Recognizing the severity of this epidemic, Canadas proposed Bill would help to create a positive space for survivors in relation to law while spreading awareness of this growing issue.
Through their prevention initiative, Selah Freedom and The Selah Way Foundation understands the importance of education and awareness on human trafficking, which is why our organization launched the nation’s first online training course for both parents and middle/high school students called Sex, lies and Media.
Sex, Lies & Media is an online training course to help them gain awareness of sex traffic recruitment on the internet as many vulnerable teens are at home unsupervised and prey to internet solicitation. The course is a 30-minute online course that is used to teach at schools across the country, but in light of Corona Virus, the program has been adapted it to be virtual.
Taking steps such as those mentioned above help push our society to acknowledge the issue at hand and take a stance to put an end to this unnerving exploitation.
