Human trafficking in Botswana

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Botswana ratified the 2000 UN TIP Protocol in August 2002.^[1]

In 2010 Botswana was a source and destination country for women and children subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically forced labor and commercial sexual exploitation. Parents in poor rural communities sometimes sent their children to work for wealthier families as domestics in cities or as herders at remote cattle posts, where some of these children were vulnerable to forced labor. Batswana girls were exploited in prostitution within the country, including in bars and by truck drivers along major highways; it did not appear, however, that organized pimping of children occurred. In the past, women reported being forced into commercial sexual exploitation at some safari lodges, but there were no similar reports during this reporting period. Residents in Botswana most susceptible to trafficking were illegal immigrants from Zimbabwe, unemployed men and women, those living in rural poverty, agricultural workers, and children orphaned by HIV/AIDS. Some women from Zimbabwe who voluntarily, but illegally, migrated to Botswana to seek employment were subsequently subjected by their employers to involuntary domestic servitude. Botswana families which employed Zimbabwean women as domestic workers at times did so without proper work permits, did not pay adequate wages, and restricted or controlled the movement of their employees by holding their passports or threatening to have them deported back to Zimbabwe.^[2]

In 2010, the Government of Botswana did not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking; however, it made significant efforts to do so. During the reporting period, the government began drafting a comprehensive anti-trafficking law, investigated potential cases of human trafficking, and provided protective services to several individuals who may have been targets of traffickers. It failed, however, to prosecute and convict trafficking offenders or make attempts to proactively identify trafficking victims among vulnerable populations, such as irregular migrants subject to deportation.^[2]

The U.S. State Department's Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons placed the country in "Tier 2" in 2017.^[3] The country was on the Tier 2 Watch List in 2023.^[4]

In 2023, the Organised Crime Index gave the country a score of 4.5 out of 10 for human trafficking.^[5]