World Day Against Trafficking in Persons – July 30, 2025

Jul 4

Theme: “Human trafficking is Organized Crime – End the Exploitation.”

Exposing Exploitation, Embracing Accountability

Every year on July 30, the world pauses to confront a brutal, hidden reality: human trafficking. This global crime, encompassing forced labour, sexual exploitation, organ trafficking, and forced marriage, victimizes millions in silence. It’s not a distant tragedy but a grave violation of human dignity that thrives under systems of inequality.

According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), human trafficking occurs in every country, whether as a place of origin, transit, or destination. In 2022, UNODC identified 69,627 victims globally. Children accounted for 38% of these cases, while women and girls made up approximately 61%, representing the majority of those trapped in these brutal systems. Forced labour and sexual exploitation remain the most prevalent forms of trafficking, reflecting a shift where forced labour slightly surpasses sexual exploitation.

The 2024 Global Report on Trafficking in Persons revealed that 50 million people remain in modern slavery; 28 million in forced labour and 22 million in forced marriage. Traffickers exploit individuals through coercion, deception, and the abuse of vulnerability. Studies suggest that victims are often lured with false promises of employment, education, or safety, only to find themselves entrapped in cycles of violence, debt bondage, and control.

Human trafficking is a deeply entrenched and underreported issue in Canada. It thrives in the shadows of systemic inequality, where poverty, housing insecurity, racism, and gaps in social services create conditions that traffickers exploit. Indigenous women and girls are especially at risk, bearing the intergenerational impacts of colonial violence and state-led family separation. These vulnerabilities are not incidental, they are structural, and they persist because the systems meant to protect are often inaccessible or unsafe.

In Alberta, human trafficking remains a pressing concern, particularly in urban centers and along transportation corridors. The province’s economy, reliance on temporary foreign workers, and geographic location contribute to both labour and sexual exploitation. Yet, public awareness remains limited, and culturally safe, trauma-informed services are not always available to those most at risk. Survivors often face stigma, criminalization, and a lack of long-term support, while traffickers operate with alarming impunity.

To address human trafficking in Alberta and across Canada, we must move beyond statistics and commit to prevention, protection, and systemic change. This includes culturally grounded community support, survivor-led services, and long-term investments in housing, education, and income security.

Focus on Survivors and Justice Systems

UNODC’s official theme for 2025, places trafficking within the larger context of transnational organized crime, calling for dismantling networks and ensuring traffickers face justice, while centering survivors in their healing, protection, and pursuit of justice. In Canada, this requires not just a legal response but a deep reckoning with the structural inequities that create conditions for exploitation, especially for IBPOC (Indigenous, Black, and People of Colour) women and children.

Survivors from these communities often carry the weight of intergenerational trauma, systemic racism, and ongoing colonization. These factors compound their vulnerability to trafficking and create additional barriers to seeking help. Distrust in institutions, stemming from histories of surveillance, violence, and neglect, leads to low rates of reporting and limited access to services. For many, systems that promise protection have historically been sources of harm.

Responding effectively requires more than awareness. It demands culturally responsive, intersectional, and trauma-informed care that recognizes the full complexity of survivors’ lives. This includes providing safe spaces that honor cultural identity and language, support networks rooted in community, and services that are attuned to the specific realities of racialized and Indigenous experiences.

Intersectional care acknowledges that experiences of trafficking cannot be separated from other forms of marginalization, be it racism, gender violence, migration status, poverty, or ableism. Trauma-informed practice requires that systems operate with an understanding of how trauma affects the body, mind, and spirit, and that support is offered in ways that foster trust, empowerment, and healing, not further harm.

Justice systems must be equipped to uphold these principles. Law enforcement, legal professionals, and service providers need training not only in identifying trafficking, but in understanding the social and historical contexts that shape survivors’ lives. Survivors must be seen not as passive victims, but as experts in their own recovery, and as leaders in shaping better responses.

Canada’s National Strategy to Combat Human Trafficking provides a framework for this work by supporting community-based, survivor-led initiatives. But this strategy must go beyond policy, survivors deserve systems that affirm their worth, reflect their realities, and support their full and lasting freedom.

What You Can Do

Educate Yourself and Others: Learn how human trafficking manifests in your community. Understand risk factors, red flags, and survivor perspectives.
Support Frontline Organizations: Donate to or volunteer with groups that assist trafficking survivors, such as the Canadian Centre to End Human Trafficking or local shelters and legal clinics.
Advocate for Policy Change: Demand stronger protections for vulnerable groups, including migrant workers, Indigenous women, and 2sLGBTQ+ youth. Call for adequate funding of anti-trafficking initiatives.
Use Your Platform: Share facts and resources. Break the silence that allows trafficking to persist.

World Day Against Trafficking in Persons is not only a time to condemn exploitation, but it is also a call to action. It urges us to stand in solidarity with survivors, challenge the systems that sustain trafficking, and commit to justice that restores dignity. Ending trafficking requires collective courage, sustained advocacy, and a deep respect for human rights.

Written by: Evetta Solomon

Resources for Further Learning & Action

· About Human Trafficking – Public Safety Canada