Carolina Women's Center

Carolina Organized Against Sexual Trafficking

Mission Statement:

Carolina Organized Against Sex Trafficking (COAST) works to generate knowledge about global and local trafficking practices and raise public awareness about the human rights violations caused by trafficking, including the mental and physical effects on its victims and the impact in our communities, and to promote action to eradicate sex trafficking.

COAST is a campus-based group which seeks to educate the campus and community about sex trafficking and its presence and impact in our community. Sex trafficking, a form of human trafficking, occurs both internationally and domestically, and is a global problem with local resonances. Goals and objectives for COAST include, but are not limited to:

Facilitate research to quantify the specific ways sex trafficking is occurring in North Carolina, and the links to international and domestic sex trafficking

Assist in efforts to inform and educate law enforcement personnel, social service providers, and the general public about trafficking so that traffickers can be prosecuted and victim-survivors can receive appropriate services.

Address the demand side of trafficking.

Contribute to efforts to eradicate trafficking.

In April 2006, the Carolina Women's Center hosted, in collaboration with many campus and community cosponsors, a highly successful international conference on sex trafficking. Every year 600,000 to 800,000 victims are trafficked across international borders, with additional persons being trafficked domestically. Between 80 to 90 percent of victims trafficked across international borders are women, half of whom are children-trafficked for sexual exploitation, forced into prostitution. The 2006 conference was organized in recognition of the fact that the trafficking of women and children is a profound global human rights violation and that human trafficking is the second largest criminal industry in the world.

The State Department estimates that between 17,500 and 18,500 people are trafficked each year into the United States; the FBI in Charlotte believes that 23% of those trafficking victims arrive in the southeast US. North Carolina's large military bases, the I-95 corridor, and our large undocumented immigrant population are just three factors that contribute to an environment susceptible to the trafficking of women and children.

Human trafficking includes both labor trafficking and sex trafficking. At the current moment, COAST efforts are focused on sex trafficking. In April 2007, the Carolina Women's Center sponsored a student conference on trafficking, organized by UNC-CH undergraduate Sarah Schwarz. In April 2008, the CWC will host its second biennial conference, which will also focus on sex trafficking.