Media Analysis Youth Crime & Trafficking In Persons MIC UNDP

| TRAFFICKING IN PERSONS

Barbados

There were forty-four (44) stories collected and reviewed for Barbados were from nine (9) media outlets and included:

MEDIA HOUSE

NUMBER OF STORIES

099.3 FM Capital HD Radio

1

92.9 FM VOB

2 2 11

Barbados Business Authority

Barbados Nation Barbados Today

14

CBC-TV

3

The Barbados Advocate 11 Table 16 – Media coverage on Trafficking in Persons from Barbados for the period June 2021 to June 2023

In an interview with Dr. Olivia Smith, a distinguished scholar at McGill University’s Max Bell School of Public Policy, is a renowned expert in labor migration and human trafficking who is dedicated to advancing human rights and combating human trafficking. Based on her experiences and observations of the media this was her response to the question of how the media typically frame stories related to human trafficking: “Normally, they typically frame around certain aspects because it’s very sensitive, sensational lives. And it is always, often about sex trafficking and women. So that’s the phrase people get to know about trafficking. But there are other dimensions. And occasionally we’ll see the labor trafficking story. But the media doesn’t pay much attention, like in the follow up for a labor trafficking issue as to the sex trafficking and one of the things that happened is that often there the conflation of trafficking, sex trafficking, and prostitution, and they’re different things. And so there’s never the tendency to look at the root causes. And I think that looking at the root causes are very, very important…. The root causes that I believe the media should look at and have some discussion on includes on why are they (victims of TIP) in this vulnerable position of exploitation? … look at the backstory of how did you get here? Why did you get here? What brought you here? More often than not, those questions are not asked by the media. And there are questions that need to be explored.” The research on Barbados and the other countries, reflected Dr. Smith’s comments. For the period under review and based on the data collection done, there were forty-four (44) media reports covering Trafficking in Persons. Most of these stemmed from regional or international reports.

72 A Media Analysis of the Coverage of Youth Involvement in Crime and Violence and Trafficking in Persons (June 2021 to June 2023) in the Eastern Caribbean

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