Protect Girls from Trafficking with Job Skills

Your gifts protect girls near the Thai border in Laos, keeping them safe at home, and safe from traffickers. Because of you, they’re learning about the danger on the other side of the border, and are learning vital skills to stay safe.

The village where Nang lives is just a few miles from the border, making residents highly vulnerable to traffickers. It's not uncommon for men to visit poor villages along the Laos-Thailand border with deceptive offers of high paying jobs in restaurants or coffee shops. But their promises are lies designed to lure the desperately poor into the sex trade.

Nang has a sweet smile and so much potential. But she is at great risk, being at the vulnerable age when most girls quit school to work and help support their families.

“Poor families see only the opportunity, not the danger,” says Olive Orate, World Concern’s country director in Laos. Roughly a third of children from this region end up as sex workers. Many from Nang’s village have gone to Thailand and never returned.

That’s where you come in. With your help, Nang and other young girls in her village are involved in our youth center where they participate in drama workshops that teach them to identify traffickers’ lies. Now, when Nang hears about a job in a coffee shop or restaurant in Thailand, she will know it’s a lie—a trap to lure her across the border and into slavery.

She’s also taking classes to learn skills, like sewing, hairstyling, and jewelry making that enable her to help support her family safely at home. With you as her protector, Nang’s future looks brighter. She and her friends see opportunities right here at home, where they are safe. And with your help, that’s where they’ll stay.