Disaggregated Estimates of the Prevalence of Trafficking in Humans (DEPTH)

The International Organization for Migration (IOM) has identified difficulties with producing prevalence estimates for trafficking in persons (TIP). The lack of accurate data or assessments of scope problematizes identification and referral of cases to protective actors, service delivery and an effective response by the criminal justice system. Further, without disaggregation of the data, e.g. by route, migratory status, demographics, and finances, it is difficult to evaluate the effectiveness of interventions. TIP prevalence estimates for trafficking to and across the Mexico-United States border vary widely and offer limited insight into individual routes or experiences, beyond demographics and sector. There are two significant and related geopolitical occurrences that shape a need for new disaggregated prevalence estimates: the expansion of transnational criminal organizations (TCOs) into the TIP industry, alongside the implementation of the United States’ Migration Protection Protocol (MPP) and Title 42 (T42) policies. Qualitative evidence suggests these changes are driving new trafficking patterns including internationalization of the routes with more than 60 country of origin groups now crossing via the southern border. However, existing estimates and trafficking maps fail to account for their impacts. Using survivor informed approaches, the proposed project—DEPTH (Disaggregated Estimates of the Prevalence of Trafficking in Humans) will undertake a TIP descriptive prevalence estimate for individuals trafficked across the southern border at two key crossing points: Del Rio (Eagle Pass, Texas) and Tucson (Phoenix, AZ). DEPTH adopts a mixed methods, survivor informed and spatial approach employing wide scale surveys, semi-structured interviews, a systematic evidence review, and spatial analysis of secondary data sources to understand the distribution of vulnerability and harm spatially, temporally, and socially. Established community based partners—the International Rescue Committee and Mission Border Hope—will implement culturally responsive, linguistically competent, and trauma informed data collection alongside their existing direct services to arriving migrants. Survivor and migrants will be incorporated in design, implementation, analysis and dissemination and centrally, a community advisory board of lived experience experts will participate across the research process. By incorporating survivor informed approaches and spatial data analysis, DEPTH will offer new contextually specific and geographically defined insights into the prevalence and characteristics of TIP within the current geopolitical context. In turn, DEPTH will provide data driven policy recommendations with stakeholder targets and recommendations, training toolkits for direct service providers and stakeholders, a roadmap to legal reform, and best practices for coproduced research design and implementation.