Hi,

I think that you have identified an extremely important issue that affects many marginalized populations involved in forced labor or human trafficking. Whether it is a sex worker, child laborer, or domestic servant, marginalized populations forced into these situations are already vulnerable and often live in unsafe conditions without freedom of choice and decisions. HIV/AIDS threatens these vulnerable populations two-fold- first in their increased risk for contracting the disease, and second, for those that do contract the disease, the inevitable stigmatization of having HIV and increased vulnerability to further marginalization.

Awareness, prevention, and a support network are absolutely critical to ensuring that the most marginalized vulnerable populations forced into modern day slavery to break this viscious cycle. Indeed, your use of the internet and blogging to reach out to youth would be a wonderful medium. I think that you could improve your proposal in several ways to achieve your objectives:

1) Develop a specific action plan along with a designated target population. Who will be your audience? Ages? Gender? How will you reach the most vulnerable populations that may not have internet access?

2) Since this competition deals specifically with modern day slavery, how does your program address the stigmatization of HIV/AIDS in the context of modern day slavery? Do you plan on targeting the specific audience of victims of survivors of sex trafficking or child labor?

3) What types of partnerships would be critical in supporting and sustaining your program? PEPFAR, the US government agency tasked with alleviating the spread of HIV/AIDS worldwide, operates in Tanzania and may be a potential source for further information and funding opportunities for you that you may wish to pursue. Further, you may wish to identify a specific area in Tanzania that is most at-risk or has the highest populations of vulnerable groups that are HIV-positive. Targeting your program to a specific area may help it become easier to implement.

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Gender Equality and Human Trafficking Specialist