Developing domestic economic opportunities to reduce trafficking risks in overseas migration: A randomized controlled trial in Tanzania

• In Event: Interventions and Measurement to Combat Human Trafficking

Abstract

Tanzania has long been a source, transit and destination country for men, women and children subjected to forced labor and sex trafficking. A recent study found 69.1% of migrant women from Tanzania experienced domestic servitude in Middle East countries, ranging from passport confiscation to physical and sexual abuses. This paper presents preliminary findings from a randomized control trial (RCT) of a pilot intervention in Dar es Salaam and Zanzibar that shows job skills training and anti-trafficking education significantly reduced overseas migration. While the pilot was limited in scale (N=43 in treatment and 42 in control), thus far a total of 37 of the treatment have graduated with no dropouts; all treatment participants have thus far stayed in Tanzania, either using their learned skills to get a job or start their own businesses. In comparison, 13 of the 42 control subjects have already left the country in search of employment overseas with the remaining either unemployed or waiting to migrate.

Authors

• Meredith Dank, New York University

• Stephen Abeyta, New York University