Our Effort To Help Stop Human Trafficking
At the beginning of second term, the UKC Stop The Traffick committee started attending meetings planning future events and how to gain more volunteers on board for the taxi campaign.
We also held elections and now have a newly elected committee. Gail is President, Ian is Vice President, Michelle is Treasurer, Alex is Social Secretary and I’m media officer. Our team along with volunteers are more determined than ever to combat human trafficking in Kent.
Refreshers Fayre held on 7th of February 2012 allowed students to sign up to new societies and we even managed to receive a snippet of university television station Kent TV promoting the Refreshers Fayre!
A few members of the society also went to the university of East Anglia conference about Human Trafficking, where they learned more about how to combat human trafficking and worked with other people at the conference to think of future ideas.
The society decided to have another film night to see “Taken,” starring Liam Neeson. The synopsis of the film was a father trying to save his daughter from being a victim of human trafficking. We also served Fair Trade chocolate at the event to persuade people to buy Fair Trade chocolate instead of chocolate that may have been made from child traffickers.
Traffik Free Chocolate
Stop the Traffik has enquired to Mondeléz formally known as Kraft, who buy more cocoa than any other chocolate company to lead the way in making the chocolate industry free from child trafficking. Stop the Traffik campaigned last year to make Toblerone traffic free, Mondelez responded by saying the company would spend $400 million making their cocoa sustainable.
The next major event for UKC against Human Trafficking held was the society’s first female football match held in March, where we raised awareness in co-ordination with Love146 campaign- Run for Love 1000. Run for Love 1000, aims to raise £150,000 to go towards “the first national programme dedicated to the care and recovery of children who have been trafficked into the UK”. The event was a success with the girls split into two teams competing and raising awareness about Human Trafficking. We also had donation buckets of which the money raised would be going towards UKC against Human Trafficking and the Love146 campaign. Alex and I also went on the Kent University radio show ‘Colours of Canterbury’ to raise awareness about Human Trafficking and the event which was nerve racking but good fun!
In the future the society hope to start the taxi campaign to raise awareness in Kent about Human Trafficking especially as taxi drivers are essentially the eyes and ears of the community. If they can recognise the signs of Human Trafficking and do something about it then, that would be great and a huge step in combating Human Trafficking. The society also hopes to work with a safe house in Kent that helps those who have dealt with human trafficking.
