Moldova is perhaps the European country with the highest rate of human trafficking. This situation is one of the results of poverty and unemployment that has plagued this country for a couple of years. Although this appears to be more popular among young adults that search for better lives outside Moldova, children are not free from the human trafficking challenges that are faced by Moldova. In the quest for better lives, lots of young people have left their children in the care of their grandparents and have gone out of the country to get ahead. The children that are left behind spend more time in the streets and become easy targets for child traffickers.
The combination of false hopes of high paying jobs and the accessibility of fake birth certificates are some of the most dangerous tools that have fueled Moldova’s human trafficking challenges. Usually, unsuspecting young women and men are taken across the Moldovan border to other parts of Europe by smugglers that pose as their guardians or parents. The fact that they are travelling with a parent coupled with the presence of a fake birth certificate makes it easy to cross the borders.
How Moldova Plans to put an end to human trafficking
In the quest to curb the ever-rising rate of human trafficking in Moldova, the Moldovan government has turned to one of the world’s latest technologies. With the use of blockchain technology, Moldova plans to reduce the rate of human trafficking across its borders. It is working in collaboration with a United States-based software company to build a system that will be used to curb the rate of child trafficking. Working with this system, the identities of children will be connected to those of their family members. This will make it difficult for children to be trafficked across the border without valid reasons.
Before a child is allowed to cross the border with an adult, the child’s eyes, and fingerprints will be scanned. This will lead to a notification of their parents or guardian, and their crossing will have to be approved before it is allowed to take place.
The use of blockchain technology in battling child trafficking is in a bid to make it glaring that the Moldovan government is committed to the fight against human trafficking.
How effective will this scheme be?
At the moment, there are no real conclusions on how this project will be funded and how data will be gotten. Also, there are anti-trafficking groups that believe this development will not be effective in the fight against child trafficking. They gave their reason as: parents/ legal guardians are aware of lots of human trafficking cases which involve children. As a result of this, getting their permission before children are allowed to cross the border will not be effective in the fight against human trafficking in Moldova. Some of these groups further argued that the creation of job opportunities is the only way to solve cases of human trafficking in the impoverished European country.
Posted from my blog with SteemPress : https://cryptocoremedia.com/moldovas-human-trafficking-challenges/
Interesting combination... Hope blockchain will help...