Project TAWE

Project TAWE – Together against Women’s Exploitation project aims to respond to one of the largest challenges that Romania has regarding the protection of women, mainly girls, against sexual violence and human trafficking. Since 2001, the U.S. Department of State,[1] in the annual Trafficking in Persons Report, has mentioned that “The Government of Romania does not… meet the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking”.

In December 2022, the European Commission underlined that the number of Romanian victims of human trafficking continuous to be the highest among all states, even if in 2004 the EU Accession Treaty included special obligations for Romania to reduce this phenomenon. About 90% of the Romanian identified victims of human trafficking are women and girls and 82% of them are sexually exploited all over Europe (ANITP, 2021 Annual Report, pg 15).

Although Romania is the top problem country for the EU fight against human trafficking actions, at the national level there is a huge lack of knowledge, understanding, action, and prevention of this phenomenon.

The aim of the present project is to strengthen the CSOs, professionals, and general public’s capacity to cooperate for prevention and early identification of cases of human trafficking of girls and women. To achieve it, the following specific objectives will be implemented:

SO1: Increasing the collaboration among CSOs, different stakeholders, and general public for early identification of potential victims (through 5 seminars, 3 ECLERhubs, and 10 CSOs/stakeholders).

SO2: Reducing the number of potential sexual based violence and human trafficking cases among Romanian girls and women through awareness activities (8 workshops with school students and professors, and an online campaign on prevention and identification of human trafficking).

SO3: Monitoring the implementation of anti-trafficking policies through 3 press releases and 1 report.

The main activities under the TAWE project are: