Maiti Nepal Selected as One Family Refugee Fund Partner

One Family and Maiti Nepal have joined forces in a new partnership to continue and scale up the fight against human trafficking across the Nepal-India border. 

Maiti Nepal was formed in 1993 when a group of teachers, journalists, and social workers joined forces with inspirational founder Anuradha Koirala to make a stand against the devastating social harm endured by females in Nepal. 

Human trafficking is the fastest-growing criminal industry in the world, second only to the drug trade, worth over 32 billion USD worldwide. In Nepal between 5,000 – 15,000 are trafficked every year, and the trafficking of girls from Nepal into India for forced prostitution is one of the easiest and busiest slave trafficking routes anywhere in the world. The India-Nepal border is open and easy to exploit, with only 14 checkpoints over 1,500 km. Children and adolescents are also trafficked into the growing sex industry in Kathmandu Valley, as well as into other countries such as Syria, South Korea, China, Malaysia, United Arab Emirates, Mexico and the United States for marriage, labour, and forced prostitution. 

Nepal’s devastating earthquakes of 2015 made an entire generation of children more vulnerable to human trafficking. Trafficking has a devastating impact on the physical, mental and emotion wellbeing of victims. They suffer from health issues including HIV/AID and malnutrition, as well as acute depression, shame, and fear. Trafficking also drives societal breakdown by taking women and girls from their families to grow a criminal industry that is exploiting vulnerable communities. 

The partnership, which sees Maiti Nepal become the key partner of One Family’s Refugee Fund, will explore the use of new technologies to disrupt trafficking, and seek to establish social enterprises which are profitable enough to secure the of Maiti Nepal’s invaluable services.

• Share

Back to Press Releases