Trafficking in Persons Report 2016 - Tier Definitions

Tier 1

Countries whose governments fully meet the Trafficking Victims Protection Act’s (TVPA) minimum standards.

Tier 2

Countries whose governments do not fully meet the TVPA’s minimum standards, but are making significant efforts to meet those standards.

Tier 2 Watch List

Countries whose governments do not fully meet the TVPA’s minimum standards, but are making significant efforts to meet those standards and:

a) The absolute number of victims of severe forms of trafficking is very significant or is significantly increasing

b) There is a failure to provide evidence of increasing efforts to combat severe forms of trafficking in persons from the previous year, including increased investigations, prosecutions, and convictions of trafficking crimes, increased assistance to victims, and decreasing evidence of complicity in severe forms of trafficking by government officials; or

c) The determination that a country is making significant efforts to meet the minimum standards was based on commitments by the country to take additional future steps over the next year.

Tier 3

Countries whose governments do not fully meet the minimum standards and are not making significant efforts to do so.