Title: Child Trafficking and Child Protection Compacts

Description: To combat child trafficking, the U.S. partners with other
countries through Child Protection Compacts. We'll find out more from
GAO's Chelsa Kenney, who looked at what is known about how well these
partnerships work. 

Related GAO Work: GAO-23-105390, Human Trafficking: Department of State
Should Strengthen Oversight of Child Protection Compacts

Released: April 2023

[Music]

[Chelsa Kenney:] Child Protection Compacts are multi-year partnerships,
and they have a specific focus on combatting child trafficking.

[Holly Hobbs:] Hi and welcome to GAO's Watchdog Report, your source for
news and information from the U.S. Government Accountability Office. I'm
your host, Holly Hobbs. About one third of human trafficking victims
around the world are children. To combat child trafficking, the U.S.
partners with other countries through Child Protection Compacts. In a
new report, we looked at what is known about how well these partnerships
work. We'll find out more from GAO's Chelsa Kenney, who led our work and
is an expert on international efforts to combat human trafficking.
Thanks for joining us.

[Chelsa Kenney:] Thanks for having me.

[Holly Hobbs:] So, Chelsa, this is a terrible topic, but it's one that
the U.S. and other countries are serious about. Maybe we can start
with--what is a Child Protection Compact and what does it allow the U.S.
and its international partners to do that they couldn't otherwise do?

[Chelsa Kenney:] So Child Protection Compacts are multi-year
partnerships. They're between the State Department and selected foreign
governments, and they have a specific focus on combating child
trafficking. The compacts are unique in that they are jointly developed
between the U.S. and the other country. And part of that agreement
includes a commitment of resources or support from both countries.

[Holly Hobbs:] And what kinds of assistance is provided through these
compacts?

[Chelsa Kenney:] So these partnerships include a series of specific
projects designed to prevent trafficking, prosecute traffickers, and
provide care for victims. And these are funded by the United States and
are implemented in the country by non-governmental organizations. So
these projects are things like training law enforcement on prosecuting
cases, or increasing community awareness about child trafficking and how
to recognize it. But the partnership had a second part, and that they
also aim to improve the capacity of the partner country to address child
trafficking in the long term. So the partner country also commits some
resources, like devoting staff to focus on the issue or providing office
space, or in a couple of places providing additional funding.

[Holly Hobbs:] Could you give us an example of an active compact? 

[Chelsa Kenney:] There have been seven partnerships, five of which are
still ongoing, like in Jamaica and two of which have been completed,
notably in the Philippines. The partnership with Jamaica began in 2018.
And there we visited child friendly spaces created in Jamaican police
stations. So these are areas with things like smaller or softer
furniture and kid friendly art on the walls. They are places where the
police can interview victims and gather information to prosecute
traffickers while trying to minimize any additional trauma to these
young victims.

[Holly Hobbs:] So for our report, we also interviewed some stakeholders
about the importance of Child Protection Compacts. Who all do we talk to
and what did they tell us?

[Chelsa Kenney:] We heard from partner countries that the Child
Protection Compacts were helpful in building a consensus and really
affirming a commitment in their country to fighting child trafficking.
You know, addressing this issue requires input and services from several
different parts of a government. And so in some cases, we found that the
compacts had led to cross-government working groups or task forces, but
they had generally created a more collaborative, more comprehensive
approach to addressing these issues.

[Holly Hobbs:] So given that, how effective are these partnerships? Do
we know if they've reduced child trafficking or prevented it?

[Chelsa Kenney:] So we found some examples of successes, but also some
opportunities for improvement. The final evaluation of the partnership
with the Philippines found that the number of investigations and
prosecutions of online sexual exploitation of children increased over
the CPC period. However, that same evaluation found that there was no
increase in community awareness that online exploitation of children was
actually a crime. And this lack of understanding is really a barrier to
preventing trafficking from happening in the first place.

{MUSIC}

[Holly Hobbs:] So Chelsa just told us that Child Protection Compacts can
provide important resources and training to international partners,
helping to combat child trafficking. But there are opportunities to
improve the impacts these partnerships can have. So, Chelsa, what do we
think needs to happen to improve efforts under Child Protection
Compacts? 

[Chelsa Kenney:] Overall, we made six recommendations to the State
Department on how they could improve their oversight of the Child
Protection Compacts. But let me just mention two key areas. First, we
found that while the Child Protection Compact indicates what resources
both the U.S. and the partner country would provide, we found that the
partner country wasn't always meeting their commitments, and the State
Department wasn't consistently following up to encourage this or to
understand why this wasn't being done. Second, we found that partner
countries weren't always developing sustainability plans to ensure that
progress made during the partnership would be continued. And again,
State Department could be doing more to encourage and engage with the
partner countries to ensure that they were doing this planning.
Improvements in these two areas, could really improve the Child
Protection Compacts, ensuring that they're being more effective and
helping to end the exploitation of children.

[Holly Hobbs:] Chelsa, last question. What's the bottom line of this
report?

[Chelsa Kenney:] You know, the Child Protection Compact model is really
a unique tool that we have to combat child trafficking across the world.
However, the State Department really needs to increase their monitoring
and oversight of these partnerships if we want to ensure that they're
actually meeting their goals. 

[Holly Hobbs:] That was Chelsa Kennedy talking about GAO's recent review
of international Child Protection Compacts. Thanks for your time,
Chelsa.

[Chelsa Kenney:] Thank you.

[Holly Hobbs:] And thank you for listening to the Watchdog Report. To
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