What is human trafficking?

The Palermo Protocol, signed in 2001 and later ratified by many countries throughout the world, defined human trafficking:

“Recruiting, transporting or transferring a person, concealing a person or receiving a person through threats or any form of coercion, abduction, fraud or abuse of power or the exploitation of a vulnerable position or granting or receiving payment or benefits to obtain the consent of a person, who has authority over another person to exploit that person.”

It is irrelevant whether the trafficked person has consented to the exploitation if the above means have been used.

Denmark is primarily a country of destination for victims of trafficking. More than half of all victims identified every year are from Nigeria. The most frequent form of exploitation remains sexual exploitation, followed by labour exploitation and forced criminality. Most victims were women in sex trafficking, but in 2018, when most were subjected to labour exploitation, there were more male victims.

Trafficking in human beings was incorrectly associated with forced sex work and women and children for many years. For example, the first Danish Action Plan in 2003 focused exclusively on women and children. However, human trafficking includes multiple forms of exploitation of people, and this fact has also now been recognized and included in the Danish Action Plans since 2016.

Globally, people are trafficked and exploited, for example, into begging, social fraud, domestic servitude, and sex work, including forced pornography, organ harvesting, and forced labour in mining, fishing, and construction industries.

The UN describes human trafficking as the fastest growing area of organized crime and has remained a high-profit, low-risk criminal enterprise despite all efforts.