At an age when we would regard them as still being children,
thousands of young girls from northern Thailand are being
lured into prostitution. Girls as young as 10 are being sold
to the brothels of Bangkok, other Thai cities and overseas.
They come from the Golden Triangle area of Chiang Rai
Province, their families trapped in a cycle of poverty and
debt. Their parents are subsistence farmers or landless villagers
with few work opportunities, who often borrow money merely
to make ends meet. At the same time, their traditional lifestyle
and values are being constantly eroded by the influx of consumer
goods. In hill-tribe villages there is also a high incidence
of drug addiction.
Faced with these pressures fathers and mothers come
to view their daughters as commodities that can be traded.
The girls obey their parentsfwishes out of a sense of duty
and to help the household income. In some villages as many
as 90% of the girls who have failed to complete their education
end up working in the sex industry. Brothel owners have networks
of argents combing the villages, seeking out troubled families
with young daughters and moving in with tempting offers of
money. So begins a cycle in which relatives, village headman,
police, official and business people all benefit from the
girlsflabour.
Once sold, the girls find it difficult to escape prostitution
or forced labour and the reality is usually very different
from what they have been promised. Many believe they are going
to work as housemaids or in laundries but instead find themselves
imprisoned in damp, dirty, overcrowded conditions. They may
be abused by clients or pimps and face the ever-present danger
of contracting HIV, which is epidemic in Thailand. |
The program
The Daughters Education program was begun in 1989 by its present
director Sompop Jantraka. From the outset, it was conceived as a
community-based initiative aimed at preventing girls being forced
into the sex industry. its headquarters are in Mae Sai, the northernmost
town in Thailand, with other centres spread across Chiang Rai. From
these bases staff work among Akha and other hill tribe groups and
lowland villages.
DEP offers girls from under 20 years old an alternative to
prostitution by providing them with education, job training and
help in finding work. From the initial group of 19 students in 1989,
the program now supports over 300 girls through schools and over
100 girls in vocational training from its regional centres. DEP
is now one of several projects conducted by the Development and
Education Program for Daughters and Communities.
Every year DEP -- in conjunction with teachers, village leaders
and monks - identifies those young girls most at risk. They are
usually girls about to complete their primary schooling, but who
are denied access to further free education or government scholarships.
Many have older sisters or other relatives already working as prostitutes.
They may be orphans or their parents may be drug addicts or divorced.
The future
While efforts are being made to address the problem within
the country, girls stream into Thailand from neighbouring Burma,
Laos and southern China. They come to work in local brothels or
use Bangkok as a staging post to other countries. As the number
of tourists in Vietnam and Cambodia increases so does the demand
for child prostitutes/ DEP is collaborating with groups in these
neighbouring countries. The aim is to publicise and respond to the
problems of cross-border trafficking and the expanding sex tourism
industry.
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