Young boys and girls who become victims of the crime of child trafficking all over the world are marketed like a commodity. They yield huge profits as slave labor in plantations and in factories, as child prostitutes, as beggars, as marriage candidates or offspring for couples willing to adopt. The children lose their trust, their health and often lose their lives as well.
Rural Chinese children are at an increasing risk of being sold or forced to become beggars, petty thieves or sex workers as their farmer parents flock to cities looking for work.
Save the Children, an international aid group has postulated that China’s women and children are at risk of being sold into forced labor or prostitution. Mass migration from China’s countryside to its cities has aggravated the disturbing trend.
Imbalance in the population, which is because of China’s one child policy, too is a cause of this tendency. China’s strict controls on the number of children people can have drives couples to abort female fetuses and allow more boys to be born. Hence, native girls lands at the risk of being trafficked, especially in the countryside.
China has a thriving black market in girls and women who are sold as brides, as well as babies who are abducted or bought from poor families for sale to childless couples or those who have one child and want more.
There are no exact figures but the Chinese government and international aid groups estimate that tens of thousands of girls and boys are being trafficked in China each year.
Experts are of the view that the number is going to rise since the poor rural dwellers tend to leave their native place to work in cities, leaving their children vulnerable to traffickers.
The condition is so deplorable that traffickers are buying children from $1,300 to $2,600. They are then sold to childless couples, or put to work as beggars, prostitutes, or pickpockets in the cities.
