Guyana achieves highest ranking in US human trafficking report

NGO’s shelter in 2016 compared to 17 in 2015. It was noted that while it signed an agreement to provide funding to the said NGO, it did not do so over the last year but instead provided $13M to another NGO that provided housing and counselling services for victims of gender-based violence, including an unknown number of trafficking victims.

The report also said that there were no adequate public-private shelters for male or child trafficking victims, despite the government’s commitment made in early 2016 to open and partially fund a shelter for male victims. Child trafficking victims were placed in non-specialised shelters, and child victims identified in rural areas were placed in holding cells overnight without food before being transferred to the capital for shelter. Male victims were offered voluntary placement in homeless shelters.

It was also found that the government maintained efforts to prevent trafficking as the anti-trafficking inter-ministerial task force remained active and met monthly. The administration also conducted a variety of awareness-raising activities, including targeting school children to educate them on trafficking and how to report suspicious activities. The government, however, did not make efforts to reduce the demand for commercial sex acts. During the reporting period, authorities conducted approximately 1,000 impromptu labour inspections in the capital and the interior.