Index

ABSTRACT

Poverty is a world wide phenomenon and is believed to be the main cause of human trafficking and Rwanda is no exception. Households  below the  poverty line  are prone to human trafficking. The aim of this study is to investigate the relationship between poverty and human trafficking. Quantitative approach was adopted. The target population of the study was 200 and the sample size is133 respondents. Stratified random sampling technique was used to select the participants. Simple random sampling was used in each stratum to get a representative sample. A questionnaire was used to collect primary data.  Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) Version 21 for windows was used as to analyze quantitative data. The findings indicated that  R=0.744   and R-Square = 0.553 which is a strong relationship between the independent variables and the dependent variable.  The significance of the F-statistic is 0.000 which is less than 0.05. This implies that null hypothesis is rejected and conclude that there is a relationship between poverty and human trafficking. The proposed model shows that poverty (Beta = 0.584) was the most important in influencing human trafficking. Thus, Beta at 0.584 is statistically significant and y intercept is at 0.657 where P value 0.000 is less than 0.05 . The model is given as ,Y=0.584 X+0.657. Orphans and single mothers are the ones who fall below the poverty line. To overcome poverty export diversification and expanding manufacturing sector is of paramount importance.

Keywords: Poverty, Human trafficking, Income dispariries, Lack of equal opportunity, Weak governance, Armed conflict, Underdevelopment, Rural-migration.

DOI: 10.20448/801.41.188.201

Citation | Gacinya John (2019). Poverty as a Factor in Human Trafficking in Rwanda. American Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities, 4(1): 188-201.

Copyright: This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License

Funding : This study received no specific financial support.

Competing Interests: The author declares that there are no conflicts of interests regarding the publication of this paper.

History : Received: 4 April 2019 / Revised: 15 May 2019 / Accepted: 24 June 2019 / Published: 8 August 2019.

Publisher: Online Science Publishing

1. INTRODUCTION

Abdullahi et al. (2014) explained poverty as the incapacitation of human beings to live a reasonable kind of life, basically being unable to access basic necessities of life such as food, shelter, safe drinking water, deprivation of opportunities to education and employment. Poverty more or less means inability of individuals to attain minimum standards of living and being not sure of what the future holds for them. For Katarina (2002) “Poverty is a human condition characterized by sustained or chronic deprivation of the resources, capabilities, choices, security and power necessary for the enjoyment of an adequate standard of living and other civil, cultural, economic, political and social rights”.

On the otherhand,trafficking in persons is the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring or receipt of persons by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability or of the giving or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person, for the purposes of exploitation (Chibba, 2013).

In addition, Human trafficking is seen as a development issue because those who fall prey to human trafficking are the vulnerable, deprived, with low income, unemployed and lack education. The poorest countries of world-Bangladesh, Mali, Moldova, and Nepal  are the ones whose citizens are trafficked.  Poor countries of South East Europe countries such as Albania, Bulgaria, Moldova, and Romania are also primary source countries for trafficked persons. In South Asia, Bangladesh and Nepal as well as West and Central Africa countries serve as splendid examples of human trafficking because of Poverty (Aronowitz, 2009).

Bhaumik et al. (2017) reveals that the global poor are predominantly rural, young, poorly educated, mostly employed in the agricultural sector, and live in larger households with more children. Indeed, 80 percent of the worldwide poor live in rural areas; 64 percent work in agriculture; 44 percent are 14 years old or younger; and 39 percent have no formal education at all. Despite progress, intolerable disparities in income still exist in many low and middle income countries.

According to Alaleeli (2015) human trafficking activities account for US$31.6 billion of profits annually and out of this US $ 4 billion is realized from brothel industry, majority of trafficking victims identified by states are women and children who make up 88% of all victims, distributed as ; 66% for women, 13% for girls, 9%  for boys, and 12%  for men. In the same vein, Dovydaitis (2010) reports that at least 800,000 people trafficked across borders annually; where about 80 percent of trans-national victims are women and girls and 20 per cent are men and boys.

Innocenti (2005) Finds that the root causes of trafficking are complex and often interrelated. Poverty, weak governance, armed conflict or lack of effective protection against discrimination and exploitation are some examples. Generalizations about the causes of trafficking for the continent of Africa, however, are misleading. It is important to understand that each country presents specific factors or different combinations of multiple factors that are unique to each situation.

Also, any analysis of trafficking flows must take into account the rapidly changing environment that can alter the trafficking patterns at local and international levels. Children orphaned by AIDS can be more vulnerable to trafficking due to the increasing poverty of their households and communities, and as a result of the stigmatization, rejection, or marginalization to which they are exposed by their communities. While poverty might induce parents to sell daughters for the purpose of marriage, children are lured by promises of a good education or better job and smuggled across borders. Far from home or in a foreign country, trafficked children disoriented, without papers, and excluded from any protective environment can be forced to endure prostitution, domestic servitude, early and involuntary marriage, or hazardous and punishing labor. Analyses of reports on trafficking in human beings in Africa typically recognize poverty as the most visible cause for trafficking in human beings (Innocenti, 2005).

Ministry of Public Service and Labor (2011) indicates, that there are about 317 million children between 5 and 17 years who are economically active and about 191 million between 5-14 years involved in child labor. Among them, about 127 million are between 15-17 years.Sub-Saharan Africa has 49 million of the working children; one per three children under 15 years of age is economically active. This underscores the positive correlation between incidences of child labor and poverty.

Other than that, human traffickers prey on people who are poor, isolated and weak. Issues such as disempowerment, social exclusion and economic vulnerability are the result of policies and practices that marginalize entire groups of people and make them particularly vulnerable to being trafficked. The vulnerability of an individual in his or her social context emerges as the missing link in formulating well-developed policies and practices towards prevention of human trafficking (UNGIFT, 2008).

The Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children, supplementing the UN Convention Against Transnational Organized Crime (Palermo Protocol ) recognizes the connection between vulnerability and human trafficking, and encourages state parties to take or strengthen measures to alleviate those factors that make people vulnerable to human trafficking, including poverty, underdevelopment, and lack of equal opportunity (Kerry, 2016).

More so, Betz (2009) examines how poverty acts as a cause of human trafficking.  To understand how this universal issue acts as a cause, three specific aspects of poverty were examined: the supply side, the demand side, and the interaction between these two forces.  The supply side of poverty is the individuals around the globe whose survival needs are not met and there are limited means to meet these needs.  The demand side of poverty refers to those industrial, agricultural or commercial pursuits that rely on these impoverished individuals being trafficked illegally to maintain a positive profit.  The interaction between these two distinct forces often leads to human trafficking. He further states that many organizations have argued that the single, most important root cause of human trafficking is the supply side of poverty. This stance is based on the idea that the individuals who cannot feed, cloth, and house themselves or their families due to lack of work are the most susceptible to the lures of traffickers  (Betz, 2009).

Betz (2009) adds that the demand side of poverty refers to those businesses that rely on cheap, often forced labor, to continue to make financial profit.  Generally, this aspect of poverty can be discussed regarding both labor and sex trafficking.  Whether referring to forced labor in factories or sex slaves, the demand side of labor is those businesses that knowingly employ impoverished, trafficked individuals at extremely low or non-existent wages.  With many economically developing countries unable to meet the growing demands for low cost labor in industrial or agricultural pursuits, many businesses within these areas have taken advantage of the victims of poverty that cross borders in search of employment.

It is a fact that poverty makes women across a variety of countries vulnerable to the modern-day sex slave trade. For example, in Albania, young women are enticed with seemingly promising offers of employment as nannies or in restaurants and are trafficked to Italy or Greece to be sold into prostitution and domestic servitude, Barner et al. (2014).

For Adepelumi (2015) the magnitude of human trafficking has reached alarming proportions in the current period. About 8 million Nigerian children are engaged in exploitative child labor and 40% of Nigerian street children and hawkers are trafficked children due to poverty.

Abdullahi et al. (2014) acknowledges that more than one third of victims of human trafficking come from, pass through or end up in South-East Asia and the world re-trafficking rate at 15-20 per cent social because of weak integration of victims of human trafficking.

In Rwanda, The population of children aged below 18 was estimated at 5,366,968 representing 49.6% of the total population. Children of the age group 6-17 were estimated at 3,423,374 representing 63.7 %. Among them, 367,810 (representing 10.74%) of children of the same age group were found laboring either in their own households or outside their own households (Mifotra, 2015).

The same survey also pointed out that 110,742 children within the age group 6-17 were working outside their own households in economic activities (representing 3% of the age group 6-17) with them 39,260 aged from 6 to 15. This survey also revealed that the agriculture sector is the largest workplace setting for children. In this regard, 40.8% of children engaged in economic activities outside their own household were in agriculture sector, followed by 31.9% engaged in domestic services, 8.1% in construction, 2.7% in industry; and 13.7 % in other activities such as trade, hotels and transportation (Mifotra, 2015).

2. PROBLEM STATEMENT

Rwanda is a small and densely populated country found in East Africa. About 80 per cent of the population is dependent on subsistence agriculture. Individual farms are too small to support a family. Agricultural production is mainly rain fed and is vulnerable to shocks, which in different parts of the country include drought and flooding. Soil fertility has deteriorated with over production and soil erosion is also a problem with land shortages forcing people to farm on steep hillsides. There is low use of fertilizer and improved seeds but the use of improved farming methods is increasing as a result of government policy (Malunda and Musana, 2012).

The proportion of men and women who are unemployed is roughly similar. Unemployment is highest amongst the young, and was twice as high for the 16-24 age group as for the 35-44 age group (Malunda and Musana, 2012). There is an excess supply of labor that is low-skilled and poorly educated and a deficit of decent jobs, with some evidence that the process matching workers and jobs is not optimal. This kind of situation breeds human trafficking.

Poor women in Rwanda are characterized by being landless labourers, smallholder agricultural producers, cross-border traders and factory and domestic workers and there is difficulty in accessing opportunities and benefits of economic growth and trade.Specifically,women in Rwanda face vulnerabilities of  lower levels of literacy,  lower levels of access to and control over resources,  lower levels of access to networks and people who can assist and support,  greater vulnerability to sexual exploitation and abuse at the community level (Gender Equality, 2011).

The low domestic saving rates in Rwanda have been partly due to a low saving culture, limited access to banking facilities especially in the rural areas and low incomes which translates into low savings for a significant portion of the population.

Children represent a large percentage of the Rwandan population, with 42.9% of the population between ages 0 and 14 and a median age of 18.8. It has been found that these children are subjected to sex trafficking and forced labor. Women and children from neighboring countries are also found as prostitutes and in forced servitude (Warda and Maureen, 2019).

The negative repercussions of the massacre continue to affect the lives of Rwanda’s children in various ways thus increasing their vulnerability to human trafficking. 40.8% of Rwandan children are engaged in economic activities outside their own household in agriculture sector, followed by 31.9% engaged in domestic services, 8.1% in construction, 2.7% in industry; and 13.7 % in other activities such as trade, hotels and transportation (Mifotra, 2015).

Despite the fact that Rwanda has made tremendous progress in many areas of social welfare as confirmed by recent surveys which indicate that the percentage of people living under poverty dropped by 5.8% from 44.9% in 2011 to 39.1% in 2014 (NISR, 2014) and during the same period, extreme poverty dropped from 24.1% to 16.3%, There is  a segment of Rwanda’s population that still lives in extreme poverty including  single mothers, orphans, homeless persons and the unemployed who  struggle to meet basic needs. Such impoverished groups of people can easily be lured into human trafficking.

In Rwanda the root causes of human trafficking are complex and often interrelated. Generalizations about the causes of this vice however can be misleading. It is important to understand the contribution of each single factor if human trafficking is to be effectively combated. The researcher found it unavoidable to discuss human trafficking without analyzing the extent to which poverty facilitates the vulnerability of the victims of human trafficking in Rwanda.

3. RESEARCH OBJECTIVE

To investigate the relationship between poverty and human trafficking in Rwanda

4. LITERATURE REVIEW

Khowaja et al. (2012) observes that poverty is a major determinant of women trafficking, women are deprived of resources, lack access to basic services, have insecurity in their daily lives are not empowered and lack the ability to speak with dignity. Where women are poor, they are in such conditions that influence them to sell the girl children into domestic servitude, prostitution, or forced marriages. In Pakistan gender inequality is very much pronounced such that males are preferred to females and in the same society sons are favored while daughters are an economic burden. Early marriages do occur and the dowry practices increase the financial burden and parents sell their daughters.

Driscoll (2011) states that the major cause of human trafficking is poverty and women are the majority of the world’s poor. The world’s poor people are about 1.3 Billion people and 70% are women. She indicates that when the former communist countries of Eastern Europe and Russia economy collapsed, women employment fell by 40% and their after women became easy target for human traffickers. This is why two-thirds of the 500,000 victims of sex trade in the European Union are from Eastern Europe.

Rahman (2011) argues that poverty is the most single factor that brings about human trafficking globally. As an example is the bonded labor in India is widespread due to the enormous poverty. Debt Bondage has been going on for generations and what drives the business of bonded labor is poverty.

Abdulraheem and Oladipo (2010) assert that women and children make up majority of the human trafficking chain as a result of push and pull factors. Push factors are mainly  found to be poverty, inequality and discrimination, resulting in survival tactics that expose the most vulnerable to human trafficking. Pull factors include the attraction of opportunity and huge economic differences that make even relatively poor neighboring regions seem better off in terms of standards of living. They further allude to the fact that globalization and income disparity between the North and South are responsible for the endless migration of people for better life. 
Bashir (2014) is of the view that human trafficking in South Asia is a result of poverty and lack of opportunities and structural inequalities with the neighboring countries. Poorer countries like Bangladesh and Nepal have a serious problem of human trafficking and this drives thousands of women and young girls to India and Middle East for sexual exploitation and hard labor.

Barner et al. (2014) notes that poverty makes women in many countries of the world prone to human trafficking. In Albania, young women recruited and promised jobs to work in restaurants and are trafficked for sexual exploitation and domestic servitude in Italy and Greece. Poor Bulgarian women are manipulated by men who promise them friendship and good life and the women volunteer to go along with them. In the United Kingdom human traffickers are able to lure poor runaway women into sex trade.

Onyejekwe (2005) finds that the problem of human trafficking in Nigeria is greatly contributed to poverty. Poverty occurs because of inadequate income and unmet basic needs that are faced by most of the women. Women do not get access to employment and educational opportunities. Thirty four percent (34%) of the Nigerian populations falls below the poverty line. Women are hard hit by poverty and it manifests itself in terms of low status, lack of self-esteem, vulnerability and even marginalization. These factors force women to leave their homes and look for jobs elsewhere and in the process are trafficked.

Corrin (2005) notes that  the poorest countries of central Europe are prone to human trafficking  and these are Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, the Republic of Moldova, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. In this region women constitute the largest group of those who are trafficked. Women are poor and marginalized. Ethnic groups such as the Roma who are poor are trafficked to Western Europe.

Acharya and Codina (2012) indicate that push factors are responsible for the trafficking of women especially for those who have the background characterized by poverty, despair and economic pressure. Human trafficking of women and children is currently happening in the poverty stricken country like Mexico, where the women and children are trafficked for sexual exploitation. About 10,000 women from the different states of Mexico are trafficked within Mexico cities and United States of America while in search of employment opportunities in the sex industry, domestic servitude, agricultural laborer, maid services at motels and hotels.

However, it is not the poor who usually migrate and use illegal routes to migrate in search for life opportunities but rather those who have some money to migrate in search for better life. The poor do not have money to spend and may not look for opportunities out of there rural life (Rijken et al., 2015). All the same, poverty implicates vulnerability to exploitative practices.

Connell (2012) points out that in 2007, 25 per cent of the Indian population live under poverty line and majority of migrant workers in India had little or no education. The caste system of India is to blame for creation of inferior population who lack of access to healthcare, education and employment opportunities. This kind of population that is unskilled in the informal labor sectors remain susceptible to job offers involving recruitment of victims of human-trafficking and this why a large local sex industry exists in major urban centers in India. There are many trafficked, enslaved or debt-bonded girls in this kind of environment with increasing numbers of women who are poor and illiterate drawn into the sex industry to survive.

In Rwanda, there is improved security and cooperation in order to fight human trafficking. Economic development and poverty reduction strategy has been key to reduce the scourge of human trafficking. Reducing human trafficking will also be achieved through cooperation with other countries in order to arrest wanted criminals, repatriate refugees in the neighboring countries and fighting transnational crimes (International Monetary Fund Country Report, 2008).

Further more, Katie (2016) exposes that women and children alike are trafficked for sexual exploitation and labor in Rwanda. Parents who face financial difficulties do leave their children to find work in agriculture and domestic work. It is during this process of finding work that children get abused sexually. Many of the urban children who are on the streets come from families that are poor as they fail to provide tuition fees for school. Many of the street kids run the risk of not schooling at an early age and expect no future employment. Urban street kids are as well exposed to sexual and labor exploitation.

Rwanda has rapid population growth coupled with declining infant mortality. This has put pressure on available land to the level that the rural population has been migrating to urban centers for work. Cultivatable land per family reduced due to population pressure. The standards of living directly relate to the size of the land owned by the individual. Those citizens with small pieces of land are the poorest of the poor. Two percent of the households do not own land and have to borrow land or share crop for survival. Half of the cultivating household own land that is less than 0.5 ha,60 % of the households use land which is less than 0.7 ha of land and  about ¼ of the households cultivate land that is less than 0.2 ha, IMFCR (2008).

Murekezi (2011) highlights that children of the age group 6-17 were estimated at 3,423,374 and 367,810 were found working either in their own households or outside their own households doing child labor. This survey also revealed that the agriculture sector is the largest workplace setting for children. In this regard, 40.8% of children engaged in economic activities outside their own household were in agriculture sector, followed by 31.9% engaged in domestic services, 8.1% in construction, 2.7% in industry; and 13.7 % in other activities such as trade, hotels and transportation. The primary cause of child labor is poverty. Poor families lack the capacity to support children’s education. The same survey stated that 22.5% of working children do not attend schools because of the cost of education; and this is linked to the phenomenon of poverty and unable to provide enough food for their households. In this context, children often work to contribute to feed their families. Therefore, without other productive assets, impoverished families often rely on children’s labor to complement their means of survival. Most affected provinces are Northern and Western provinces. Despite progress in school enrollment and the dissemination and enforcement of laws protecting children against child labor, the phenomenon seems to persist.

Pooley (2004) confirms that there has been significant out flow of Rwandans to neighboring countries in the past decades and in some cases as a result of deprivation. There have also been labor migrants to mines in Democratic Republic of Congo and tea plantations in Uganda since colonial times. Internal and international trafficking of women and children for labor and sexual trafficking has been reported. There are prostitutes and street children who are prone for exploitation in terms of labor and sexual exploitation. Rural urban migration is taking place because of land pressure and as a result of an ever increasing population density on land and continuous subdivision of household land among family members. Most people move to Kigali city to tap employment and education opportunities.

Rwanda National Youth Policy (2015) states that 38% of the youthful population in Rwanda live in poverty as 19.6 % of the youth live in extreme poverty. The false promises offered by traffickers can be convincing to the youth who are underemployed and living below the poverty line. Job offers to the youth in another country can be seen as an opportunity to solve many problems. In any case this can be misleading and often resulting into forced labor and prostitution.  Findings indicate that there is internal and cross-border trafficking of girls and women, as well as cross-border movement of children for commercial sexual exploitation. Police statistics reveal 153 cases of human trafficking registered between 2009 and 2013, the majority of the victims being young females below the age of 35.

USAID (2015) states that Rwanda has unemployment problem, but has also a youth bulge of 54% youth who are under 20 years. The number of graduates is likely to outpace the number of job opportunities. Given the combination of this youth bulge and rural work force that lacks occupation because of land scarcity there is a likelihood of insecurity, potentially leading to into sexual abuse and human trafficking, especially among the youth who are females.

Ministry of Gender and Family Promotion (2011) stresses that women economic dependency and poverty influences gender-based violence including human trafficking.  Lack of a personal income, lack of fair-wage jobs, minimum education make women depend on their partners, and thus more vulnerable to human trafficking.

Uwimbabazi and Lawrence (2011) point out that rural urban migration occurs in Rwanda is as a result of poverty in the rural areas. Rural Rwanda depends on agriculture and land is scarce on which to cultivate crops and so people move to urbans centers including Kigali city. Movement of people to the urban creates vulnerabilities that influence human trafficking

5. METHODOLOGY AND MATERIAL

In this study quantitative and qualitative research designs were applied where strengths of each research design reinforce each other. Similarly, weakness of each research design would be mitigated in order to better understand the problem of poverty in Rwanda. Target population from which a sample was taken was 200 respondents. By use of Slovian’s formula (1967) where, n = N / (1 + N. e2) cited by Maina and Omwenga (2016) the size of the sample became 133 respondents. The sampling techniques used were stratified sampling technique to increase statistical efficiency and provide adequate data for analyzing the various strata. Ten strata were used and comprised of 21 victims of human trafficking, 7 traffickers, 23 police investigators, 13prosecutors, 13 judges, 10 local authorities, 10 migration officers, 11 International transporters, 8 International migration officers (IOM) and 17 homeless. Research instruments comprised of a questionnaire for quantitative data (On a five-point Likert scale questions) and Unstructured as well as semi-structured interviews for qualitative research design.

In the case of quantitative research design, data was collected, processed and analyzed in accordance with the objectives of the study. Statistical package of social sciences (SPSS version) Version 21.0 was used to in the study to obtain descriptive as well as inferential statistics.

6. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

The research established poverty as a factor in human trafficking the following findings were interpreted as follows: 1-5, 1-Agree, 2-Strongly Agree, 3-Disagree, 4-Strongly disagree, 5-Indifferent.

Table 1. Indicates that out of the 133 respondents, 33.1% agreed that Youth in Rwanda are lured into trafficking by promises of education and employment, 59.4% strongly agreed that Youth in Rwanda are lured into trafficking by promises of education and employment 4.5% disagreed that Youth in Rwanda are lured into trafficking by promises of education and employment,1.5%  strongly disagreed Youth in Rwanda are lured into trafficking by promises of education and employment, 1.5% had indifferent observation about Youth in Rwanda are lured into trafficking by promises of education and employment .

Table 1  Indicates that out of the 133 respondents ,46.6% agreed Youth from poor families drop out of school and engage themselves in trade and eventually into human trafficking, 33.1% strongly agreed that Youth from poor families drop out of school and engage themselves in trade and eventually into human trafficking,5.3% disagreed that Youth from poor families drop out of school and engage themselves in trade and eventually into human trafficking,4.5%  strongly disagreed Youth from poor families drop out of school and engage themselves in trade and eventually into human trafficking, 10.5% had indifferent observation about Youth from poor families drop out of school and engage themselves in trade and eventually into human trafficking.

Source: Primary Data,2018.

Table 1  Indicates that out of the 133 respondents, 42.9% agreed that Orphans and single mothers from poor families engage in economic activities such as agriculture, construction, industry, trade, and hospitality, 30.1% strongly agreed that Orphans and single mothers from poor families engage in economic activities such as agriculture, construction, industry, trade, and hospitality, 11.3% disagreed that Orphans and single mothers from poor families engage in economic activities such as agriculture, construction, industry, trade, and hospitality,9.0%  strongly disagreed Orphans and single mothers from poor families engage in economic activities such as agriculture, construction, industry, trade, and hospitality, 6.8% had indifferent observation about Orphans and single mothers from poor families engage in economic activities such as agriculture, construction, industry, trade, and hospitality.

Table 1  Indicates that out of the 133 respondents, 50.4% agreed that The homeless who stay on the streets of Kigali and are from poor families are the ones who fall victims of sexual and labor exploitation, 33.8% strongly agreed that The homeless who stay on the streets of Kigali and are from poor families are the ones who fall victims of sexual and labor exploitation,8.3%  disagreed that  The homeless who stay on the streets of Kigali and are from poor families are the ones who fall victims of sexual and labor exploitation, 3.8% strongly  disagreed that The homeless who stay on the streets of Kigali and are from poor families are the ones who fall victims of sexual and labor exploitation,3.8%  had an indifferent observation about The homeless who stay on the streets of Kigali and are from poor families are the ones who fall victims of sexual and labor exploitation.

Table 1.  Indicates that out of the 133 respondents ,46.6% agreed that The majority of people who lack necessities of life such as food are easily trafficked, 37.6% strongly agreed that The majority of people who lack necessities of life such as food are easily trafficked,10.5% disagreed that The majority of people who lack necessities of life such as food are easily trafficked,5.3%  strongly disagreed The majority of people who lack necessities of life such as food are easily trafficked, and 0% had indifferent observation The majority of people who lack necessities of life such as food are easily trafficked.

6.1. Human Trafficking

The findings of human trafficking are interpreted as follow,1- 5,1-agree,2-strongly agree,3-disagree,4-strongly disagree,5-indifferent

Source: Primary Data,2018.

According to Table 2 among the contacted respondents, 21.1% agreed that Rwanda is a source of human trafficking, 57.9% strongly agreed that Rwanda is a source of human trafficking 15.0% disagreed that Rwanda is a source of human trafficking 5.3% strongly disagreed that Rwanda is a source of human trafficking, 0.8% had indifferent observation about Rwanda is a source of human trafficking. And also,16.5% agreed that Rwanda is a transit route, 68.4 strongly agreed that Rwanda is a transit route, 7.5% disagreed that Rwanda is a transit route 6.0%strongly disagreed Rwanda is a transit route 1.5% had indifferent observation about Rwanda is a transit route.

Table 2.  Indicates that out of the 133 respondents, 18.0% agreed Rwanda is a destination, 16.5% strongly agreed that Rwanda is a destination, 45.1% disagreed that Rwanda is a destination 6.0% strongly disagreed Rwanda is a destination 14.3% had indifferent observation about Rwanda is a destination.

Table 2.  Indicates that out of the 133 respondents, 36.1% agreed that process/A number of victims were rescued and returned to Rwanda, 48.9% strongly agreed that A number of victims were rescued and returned to Rwanda, 12.8% disagreed that A number of victims were rescued and returned to Rwanda 0.8% strongly disagreed A number of victims were rescued and returned to Rwanda 1.5% had indifferent observation about A number of victims were rescued and returned to Rwanda.

In addition, Table 2.  Indicates that out of the 133 respondents, 25.6% agreed There victims of human trafficking in rehabilitation centers, 55.6% strongly agreed that There victims of human trafficking in rehabilitation centers, 12.0% disagreed that There victims of human trafficking in rehabilitation centers, 3.8% strongly disagreed There victims of human trafficking in rehabilitation centers, 1.5% had indifferent There victims of human trafficking in rehabilitation centers.

Furthermore Table 2.  Indicates that out of the 133 respondents, 59.4% agreed that There Rwandans who risk who risk being trafficked today, 23.3% strongly agreed that There Rwandans who risk who risk being trafficked today, 3.0% disagreed that There Rwandans who risk who risk being trafficked today, 4.5% strongly disagreed that There Rwandans who risk who risk being trafficked today, 9.8% had indifferent that There Rwandans who risk who risk being trafficked today.

6.2. Correlation o Poverty on Human Trafficking

The Pearson correlation denoted as (r) between poverty and human trafficking was computed and the resulted as 0.5 (p=0.000). The Table 3 shows that there is a moderate association between the two variables, since the correlation coefficient is in range between 0.4 and 0.6 according to Dancey and Reidy (2004) categorization.

Source: SPSS version 21,The relationship between poverty and human trafficking.

6.3. Regression Results for Poverty to Human Trafficking

Regression analysis was conducted to empirically determine where poverty was a significant determinant of human trafficking. Regression results in Table 3 indicate the goodness of fit for the regression between poverty and human trafficking was satisfactory in the linear regression..

a. Predictors: (Constant), Poverty.

Result from Table 4 indicates that, there is a strong linear relationship between poverty and human trafficking according to R=0.744 and R2 =0.553, means that 55.3% of variation in human trafficking is explained in poverty and the remaining 44.7% is explained in other variables.

a. Dependent Variable: Human trafficking .
b. Predictor: (Constant), Poverty.

Table 5 indicates that the value of p value is 0.000, which is small, meaning that the null hypothesis is rejected. Hence this helps us to say the poverty is statistically significance in explaining human trafficking.

a. Dependent Variable: Human trafficking process
Source: SPSS Version 21,The relationship between poverty and human trafficking.

To test the significance of a regression of poverty and human trafficking deeply, the regression unstandardized coefficients and intercept have been take into consideration in order to see whether they are significance. The null hypothesis states that ß=0, meaning there is no relationship between poverty and human trafficking. And the results from Table 6 shows that ß=0.584 with small p value of 0.000 i.e. p value is small comparing to α=0.05,at this, we have enough  evidence to say that ß is statistically significance, and also the intercept is 0.657 with  the small p value, also which is significance. Therefore, the model is written as follows:
Y=0.657+ 0.584X, which is statistically significant fit.

7. CONCLUSION

The findings show evidence that Rwanda still has people who are below the poverty line. The main causes of poverty being unemployment, land scarcity and long dry spells. The key victims of poverty are orphans, single mothers, the landless individuals in the rural community and the unemployed. These very groups make up the majority of potential victims of human trafficking in Rwanda according to the findings of this study.

Rwanda has unemployment problem among the youth and women. Women mostly depend on their husbands to earn an income of their own. The number of young graduates from universities who join the labor force is far greater than the number of jobs created and the problem is compounded by large numbers of rural people who own small plots of land such that large numbers of people go underemployed. This kind of situation is a potential ground for human trafficking to thrive.

Poverty has led some parents incapable of sending their children to school, even though the government has offered free education as children have to support their parents by working in the agriculture and domestic work as means to provide basics such as food on which the family depends. Street children are born of the fact that their parents are unable to send their children to school, this indicates that such children can never chance to have job placements in the future and this perpetuates vulnerability for human trafficking.

There are both internal and internal trafficking of persons, Internal human trafficking takes place where there rural urban migration in which cultivatable land has become limited, as there is international human trafficking that takes place across the borders where girls and women are promised false employment opportunities.

It is important to understand that there are many factors that facilitate human trafficking, but the major one has been poverty. The government of Rwanda sees poverty reduction strategy as one of the tools to use to reduce the vulnerability to human trafficking prone groups such as the orphans, street kids, and unemployed and under employed youth as well as and the landless individuals in the rural community.

8. RECOMMENDATIONS

Having found out that the majority of the people in Rwanda who are vulnerable to human trafficking are the poor such as the orphans, street kids, unemployed and the landless individuals in the rural community, the following actions are recommended:

The government of Rwanda should increase the rate at which jobs are being created and in a sustainable manner. The government of Rwanda should again develop its human capital with skills in different capacities to enhance employment creation for the entire population which is dominated by the youth government should establish a vocational training in each district purposely to help the young people to gain certain level of skills to enable them become self-employed and make use of their effort in development. Agriculture is the mainstay of Rwanda and so extension of irrigation schemes in all parts of the country at subsidized costs can mitigate the problem of dry spells and make it able to produce crops all the year around. There should be development of mechanisms to encourage people in Rwanda to have a better mentality and attitude towards work, and there should be mobilization of resources that are directed to poverty eradication especially from bilateral and multilateral organizations.

REFERENCES

Abdullahi, M., M.A. Deribe and S.K. Mustapha, 2014. An assessment of the relationship between human trafficking and poverty in Nigeria. Journal of Humanities and Social Science, 19(10): 49-52.Available at: https://doi.org/10.9790/0837-191064952.

Abdulraheem, S. and A. Oladipo, 2010. Trafficking in women and children: A hidden health and social problem in Nigeria. International Journal of Sociology and Anthropology, 2(3): 034-039.

Acharya, A. and M.R.B. Codina, 2012. Poverty and trafficking of indigenous women in Mexico: Some evidence from Chiapas state. Journal of Sustainable Society, 1(3): 63-69.

Adepelumi, B.P., 2015. Root causes of human trafficking in Nigeria. Nigeria: African Center For Advocacy & Human Development. p: 1-2.

Alaleeli, H., 2015. Reforming the legal regulation of human trafficking into the UAE, with particular reference to the law in the UK. Doctoral Dissertation, Nottingham University. pp: 24.

Aronowitz, A.A., 2009. Human trafficking, human Misery: The global trade in human beings. Westport: Praeger Publishers. pp: 24.

Barner, J., D. Okech and M. Camp, 2014. Socio-economic inequality, human trafficking, and the global slave trade. Societies, 4(2): 148-160.Available at: https://doi.org/10.3390/soc4020148.

Bashir, U.M., 2014. Human trafficking in South Asia: issues of corruption and human security. International Journal of Social Work and Human Services Practice, 2(1): 18-27.

Betz, D.L., 2009. Human trafficking in South East Asia: Causes and policy implications.. United States Navy. Naval Postgraduate School June 2009. Master’s Thesis. pp: 23-34.

Bhaumik, S.K., I.N. Gang and Y. Myeong-Su, 2017. Poverty’s deconstruction: Beyond the visible, GLO Discussion Paper, No. 147, Global Labor Organization (GLO), Netherlands:Maastricht. pp: 3.

Chibba, M., 2013. Human trafficking and migration: Concepts, linkages and new frontiers. Global policy essay. Canada:(Toronto): International Center for Development and Poverty Reduction. pp: 1-8.

Connell, L.M., 2012. Human-trafficking for sexual exploitation in Australia: The deafening silence on demand. A Thesis Submitted in Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Melbourne: Victoria University. pp: 78.

Corrin, C., 2005. Transitional road for traffic: Analysing trafficking in women from and through Central and Eastern Europe. Europe-Asia Studies, 57(4): 543-560.Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/09668130500105118.

Dancey, C. and J. Reidy, 2004. Statistics without maths for psychology using SPSS for windows. London: Prentice Hall. pp: 17.

Dovydaitis, T., 2010. Human trafficking: The role of the health care provider. Maryland: Rock Ville, The US National Library of Medicine. pp: 1.

Driscoll, K., 2011. Micro credit: Not a panacea to end human trafficking in women. U. of Pennsylvania Journal of Business Law, 13(1): 279. USA: University of Pennsylvania.

Gender Equality, 2011. Poverty reduction task on empowerment. Women economic empowerment issue paper. UK: University of Sussex, Institute of Development Studies. pp: 10.

Innocenti, I., 2005. Trafficking in human beings especially women and children in Africa. Italy: Innocenti Research Center. pp:10-40.

International Monetary Fund Country Report, 2008. Poverty reduction strategy paper. Washington DC: International Monetary fund Publication Services. pp: 83.

Katarina, 2002. Globalization and human rights of women. Finland (Turku): Abo Akademi University of Human Rights. pp: 58.

Katie, K., 2016. Children of Rwanda: Realizing children’s rights in Rwanda. Kigali: Humanium. pp: 3.

Kerry, J.F., 2016. Trafficking in persons report. USA (Washington DC): United States of America Department of State. pp: 8.

Khowaja, S.S., A. Tharani and A. Agha, 2012. Women trafficking: Causes, concerns, care! JPMA. The Journal of the Pakistan Medical Association, 62(8): 835-838.

Maina, L.M. and J. Omwenga, 2016. Cultural factors influencing project management in ICT multinational corporations in Nairobi county. International Journal of Scientific and Research Publications, 6(11): 364. Kenya (Nairobi): Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology.

Malunda, D. and S. Musana, 2012. Rwanda economic transformation: Rwanda case study on economic transformation. Kigali: Institute of Policy and Research. pp: 9-13.

Mifotra, 2015. National policy on elimination of child labour.

Ministry of Gender and Family Promotion, 2011. National strategic plan for fighting against gender-based violence. Rwanda: Kigali: 9.

Ministry of Public Service and Labor, 2011. Rwanda national policy for elimination of child labor. Rwanda: Kigali. pp: 2.

Murekezi, A., 2011. National policy on elimination of child labor. Kigali: Public Service. pp: 1-4.

NISR, 2014. National institute of Statistics Rwanda. Rwanda Poverty Profile Report - Results of EICV, 4: 21–25.

Onyejekwe, C.J., 2005. Influences of global human trafficking issues on Nigeria: A gender perspective. Journal of International Women's Studies, 7(2): 141-151.

Pooley, C., 2004. Migration and pro-poor policy in East Africa. United Kingdom: Sussex Center for Migration Research. pp: 36-42.

Rahman, M.A., 2011. Human trafficking in the era of globalization. The case of human trafficking in the global market economy. Transience Journal, 2(1): 54-71.

Rijken, C., L. Van Waas, M. Gramatikov and D. Brennan, 2015. The nexus between statelessness and human trafficking in Thailand. Wolf Legal Publishers.

Rwanda National Youth Policy, 2015. Towards a happy generation. Rwanda (Kigali): NYC. pp: 14-18.

UNGIFT, 2008. An introduction to human trafficking: Vulnerability, impact and action. The Vienna Forum to Fight Human Trafficking: 7-8.

USAID, 2015. Country development cooperation strategy (2015-2020). Rwanda: Kigali: 16.

Uwimbabazi, P. and R. Lawrence, 2011. Compelling factors of urbanization and rural-urban migration in Rwanda. Rwanda Journal, 22(B): 10. Rwanda: University of Rwanda Department of Social Sciences.

Warda, D. and F. Maureen, 2019. Humanium Rwanda :Realising children’s right in Rwanda,Rwanda at glance. Rwanda: Kigali. pp: 1.