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Case Study
Through education and job training, girls have
a chance at better lives
Stopping Trafficking Before It Starts
Photo: Pacific Links/Nguyen Thi Phuong Thao
The ADAPT program in Vietnam encourages community and parental involvement to limit obstacles that prevent girls from attending school. For example, participants in An Giang province’s Chau Phu district received bicycles to help them make the daily trek to schools, which are up to five miles away.
“The ADAPT education program aims to prevent trafficking by keeping girls and women in school or in stable employment."
Challenge
In Vietnam, severe poverty limits educational opportunities for many girls since the costs associated with primary schooling pose a great financial burden on poor families. Girls who have dropped out of school must often help their families bear financial burdens, yet work is hard to find for those with limited education and no vocational skills. These girls are prime targets for traffickers, who lure them across the border into Cambodia with promises of jobs as nannies or waitresses in its capital, Phnom Penh, and other parts of the country. Once there, they may be trapped in brothels and forced into prostitution.
Initiative
Since 2005, USAID has worked to prevent the trafficking of girls and women in the Mekong Delta by improving their life options. The An Giang/Dong Thap (ADAPT) Alliance is an education program that provides scholarships, vocational training, and job placement services to at-risk girls in three Vietnamese provinces along Cambodia’s border. It funds participants’ school fees, supplies, and after-school tutoring, from fourth or fifth grade to high school graduation. For girls who have already dropped out of school, ADAPT works with local businesses to provide training and job placement services catering to the local market, enabling them to pursue stable employment with reasonable wages. For those who have escaped prostitution, ADAPT provides services such as counseling, training, income-earning opportunities, and health care to prevent them from being trafficked again.
Results
Of the program’s 495 scholarship recipients, ADAPT records a dropout rate of only 8,4 percent — lower than the provincial average of 11 percent. The USAID project also places the girls in jobs and trains them on workplace culture to bring a smooth transition and keep more girls employed longer. To reduce the likelihood that returned trafficked victims will be trafficked again, ADAPT helps their parents find stable sources of income as well.
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