New Interactive Online Tool to Support the Integration of Sex Trafficking Survivors
ICMC Europe’s new interactive online tool provides a pathway to ease the integration of survivors of international sex trafficking in their host communities.
Over the past years, awareness of human trafficking has increased. Still, much remains unknown about how survivors can best be integrated into communities once they are free from exploitation. A new interactive online tool made available by the International Catholic Migration Commission’s Europe office aims to help organizations working with survivors of human trafficking.
Through the 2019-2020 Right Way Project, ICMC Europe and seven of its partners developed an integration pathway handbook to help identify and provide appropriate services to migrant survivors of sex trafficking. The guide, released late last year, includes case studies of Nigerian woman and girl survivors of sex trafficking in Italy, a description of the different services necessary to achieve integration, and examples of good practices.
Based on the project’s research, the new interactive tool released in January 2021 offers a visual, interactive representation of the Right Way Handbook’s content. It focuses on the four phases of a survivor’s transition towards integration, which are: the detection of trafficking, the restoration of survivors’ rights, recovery, and autonomy. The interactive tool maps out the roles that survivors and host communities (local communities and countries of welcome) should play to enhance a survivor’s chances of achieving successful integration.
Responding to survivors’ needs is never a one size fits all process, and “the benchmarks provided by the interactive tool need to be adapted to each context,” ICMC Europe project officer Abigail Maristela explains. “Although there are general themes and steps towards integration, the process will look different for every survivor. That’s why a person-centered approach is key ― taking into consideration the needs, desires, and limits of each individual.”
ICMC Europe’s partners in the Right Way project include Associazione Comunità Papa Giovanni XXIII, Fondazione Caritas Trieste, Caritas Senigallia Onlus, Caritas Pescara Penne, Comunita Progetto Sud, Associazione Diakonia Onlus Vicenza, and Farsi Prossimo di Caritas Faenza-Modigliana.
In addition to the Right Way Handbook and ICMC Europe’s pathway to integration and interactive tool, the project also included a comparative literature review of integration across Belgium, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, and Sweden, a mapping of good practices, and seven pilot projects in Italy.
- Discover ICMC Europe’s interactive online tool to support the integration of survivors of international human trafficking, available in English and French
- Discover the Right Way Handbook, available in English, French, Italian and Spanish
- Learn more about the Right Way project
