Our partnership with LIFT International

Thailand is a source, destination and transit country for sex trafficking. Arguably it is the hub of commercial sex in Southeast Asia, and as a result there are a plethora of establishments from open fronted bars to backstreet brothels. If traffickers and child sex offenders believe they face a high risk of being prosecuted, convicted, and imprisoned, this will create a powerful deterrent that will drive them out of business. This will also prevent further victims from being trafficked, a method referred to as prevention through prosecution. Despite more than two decades of substantial investment in counter-trafficking initiatives, the global community is losing the war against traffickers. Historically, strategies to reduce trafficking have focused on the behavior of victims: attempting to prevent vulnerable people from becoming victims through advocacy and awareness programs, or rescuing and protecting victims through aftercare and rehabilitation. But trafficking is a crime committed by offenders, not victims. This calls for an approach that includes prevention, persecution, and aftercare for survivors. 

One Day’s Wages partnered with LIFT International to provide critical support to survivors through LIFT’s Protect Team. LIFT International serves men, women and children from many countries who find themselves exploited and in need of assistance. Along with their prevention through prosecution efforts, LIFT works with government agencies and other non-governmental organizations to get survivors of trafficking the care and support they need. This partnership empowered LIFT’s social workers in their aftercare work, supported Love Packs for survivors at government shelters or at home, endowed a Survivor Fund that provides cash assistance or scholarships to survivors of exploitation as they are repatriated and rehabilitated in their home communities, and trained other caregivers working with vulnerable and exploited people.