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Mis­sion 89, in part­ner­ship with Lough­bor­ough Uni­ver­si­ty and the Com­mon­wealth Par­lia­men­tary Asso­ci­a­tion UK branch (CPA UK), has released the first-ever com­pre­hen­sive Glob­al The­mat­ic Report on Sport Traf­fick­ing, pre­sent­ing a rig­or­ous aca­d­e­m­ic and pol­i­cy-ori­ent­ed analy­sis of human traf­fick­ing with­in the glob­al sports ecosystem.

The report inte­grates a com­pre­hen­sive lit­er­a­ture review, inter­dis­ci­pli­nary expert con­sul­ta­tions, foren­sic analy­sis of doc­u­ment­ed traf­fick­ing inci­dents, com­par­a­tive inter­na­tion­al pol­i­cy assess­ment, includ­ing con­tri­bu­tions from glob­al experts. While high­light­ing the eco­nom­ic ben­e­fits of the sports indus­try, which is esti­mat­ed to be between $471 bil­lion and $1.4 tril­lion annu­al­ly, the report sheds light on how this lucra­tive indus­try has become a mag­net for traf­fick­ers exploit­ing vul­ner­a­ble indi­vid­u­als, par­tic­u­lar­ly young ath­letes from the Glob­al South.

Accord­ing to indus­try stake­hold­ers, the absence of a spe­cif­ic def­i­n­i­tion for ‘sport traf­fick­ing’ has pre­sent­ed sig­nif­i­cant chal­lenges in dis­tin­guish­ing the phe­nom­e­non from migrant smug­gling, irreg­u­lar migra­tion, and oth­er forms of human traf­fick­ing, there­by pre­vent­ing tar­get­ed Inter­ven­tions. In addi­tion, the US Depart­ment of State has iden­ti­fied sig­nif­i­cant reg­u­la­to­ry gaps with­in sport gov­ern­ing bod­ies. Even estab­lished reg­u­la­tions, such as FIFA’s pro­hi­bi­tion on inter­na­tion­al trans­fers of minors, have revealed numer­ous loop­holes and enforce­ment challenges.

The report intro­duces a schol­ar­ly and pre­cise def­i­n­i­tion of sport traf­fick­ing, referred to as a sys­tem­at­ic process of recruit­ing and exploit­ing indi­vid­u­als with­in the sport­ing domain, char­ac­terised by coer­cive mech­a­nisms that com­pro­mise indi­vid­ual auton­o­my and fun­da­men­tal human rights. It not only involves the direct exploita­tion of ath­letes but also extends to the myr­i­ad ways through which the indus­try can serve as a con­duit for labour and sex­u­al exploita­tion, espe­cial­ly dur­ing mega sport­ing events which attract increased demand for infor­mal labour and enter­tain­ment ser­vices (that may involve traf­fick­ing for sex­u­al exploitation).

For Dr Ser­hat Yil­maz, the Lead Researcher of the report and Senior Lec­tur­er in Sports Law at Lough­bor­ough Uni­ver­si­ty, it is quite straight­for­ward. “With­out a pre­cise, sport-spe­cif­ic def­i­n­i­tion of traf­fick­ing, we are deal­ing with inad­e­quate legal pro­tec­tions, inef­fec­tive pol­i­cy devel­op­ment, chal­lenges in iden­ti­fy­ing and sup­port­ing vic­tims, lim­it­ed pre­ven­tion strate­gies, and blurred legal dis­tinc­tions that allow per­pe­tra­tors to escape account­abil­i­ty. There­fore, our objec­tive is to bring sport traf­fick­ing out of the shad­ows and into focused, action­able legal and social frame­works”, he explained.

The report also presents a typol­o­gy of sport traf­fick­ing sup­port­ed by case stud­ies that are iden­ti­fied and devel­oped through the research. This typol­o­gy of sport traf­fick­ing, as anoth­er nov­el aspect of the doc­u­ment, pro­vides an overview of the dif­fer­ent types of traf­fick­ing evi­dent in, through, and around sports. In each case, the exis­tence of the type of traf­fick­ing is deter­mined by the pres­ence of the nec­es­sary con­stituent ele­ments of the traf­fick­ing crime as per the def­i­n­i­tion of the UN Traf­fick­ing in Per­sons (TIP) Protocol.

“Aligned with Unit­ed Nations Sus­tain­able Devel­op­ment Goals 8.7 and 16.2, the research pro­vides a foun­da­tion­al schol­ar­ly con­tri­bu­tion to under­stand­ing and mit­i­gat­ing traf­fick­ing vul­ner­a­bil­i­ties”, said Leri­na Bright, Exec­u­tive Direc­tor, Mis­sion 89. “With a clear and spe­cialised def­i­n­i­tion, we can pro­vide clear­er legal frame­works, guide more effec­tive pol­i­cy­mak­ing, improve vic­tim sup­port mech­a­nisms, enable more tar­get­ed edu­ca­tion­al efforts and help the judi­cia­ry bet­ter rec­og­nize and address these spe­cif­ic traf­fick­ing cases.”

The report rec­om­mends that leg­is­la­tors and par­lia­men­tar­i­ans devel­op and imple­ment domes­tic anti-traf­fick­ing laws that align with the TIP Pro­to­col and rel­e­vant region­al instru­ments. It advo­cates for a ‘non-pun­ish­ment’ pro­vi­sion to pro­tect traf­fick­ing vic­tims, par­tic­u­lar­ly migrant ath­letes, from crim­i­nal pros­e­cu­tion for actions stem­ming from their traf­fick­ing expe­ri­ences. Experts also advo­cat­ed for the intro­duc­tion of a new recog­nised form of exploita­tion encom­pass­ing severe forms of eco­nom­ic exploita­tion in order to pro­vide stronger pro­tec­tion for vul­ner­a­ble athletes.

Pol­i­cy­mak­ers should also adjust immi­gra­tion frame­works for ath­letes to reduce traf­fick­er exploita­tion oppor­tu­ni­ties and ensure recruit­ment fol­lows inter­na­tion­al best prac­tices for labour rights. In addi­tion, build­ing capac­i­ty through tar­get­ed train­ing for iden­ti­fy­ing sport traf­fick­ing and improv­ing data col­lec­tion will be essen­tial for rais­ing aware­ness and address­ing this crit­i­cal issue.

The report iden­ti­fies a range of dif­fer­ent areas for improve­ment in efforts to com­bat sport traf­fick­ing and more effec­tive­ly pro­tect vul­ner­a­ble ath­letes and aspir­ing ath­letes. They are con­sol­i­dat­ed as a set of rec­om­men­da­tions for pol­i­cy­mak­ers, law enforce­ment, pros­e­cu­tors, the judi­cia­ry, ser­vice providers, and sport organ­i­sa­tions. In this respect, the insight of this report, typolo­gies, and inter­pre­tive guide pro­vide sup­port and guid­ance for these actors in pur­su­ing the rec­om­men­da­tions and sup­port­ing anti-traf­fick­ing efforts.