Iowa State is working with the Network Against Human Trafficking to present the first Iowa Conference on Human Trafficking, to be held Wednesday, Oct. 26, from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. in the Memorial Union.

The U.S. Department of State estimates that 14,500 to 17,500 people, primarily women and children, are trafficked to the United States annually, and of the 27 million individuals being trafficked globally, less than 5 percent of these victims have actually been identified. Specifically in Iowa, there has been 125 victims identified since 2005.

Teresa Downing-Matibag, assistant professor of sociology and executive director of NAHT, has been instrumental in planning Wednesday’s conference. Downing hopes that by raising awareness of human trafficking, individuals, businesses, and universities, will become more active in combating labor and sex trafficking and regulating this “modern-day slavery”.

“We hope to raise awareness about human trafficking in Iowa and across the globe and to empower the people of Iowa to identify, rescue and restore victims of labor and sex trafficking in our state,” Downing-Matibag said.

“Human trafficking is a rapidly growing, international human rights concern … if we allow this human rights violation to continue, unabated, it is going to become even more embedded in our culture,” Downing-Matibag said. “Pretending it isn’t there, or that it happens to people other than ourselves and our families, is only going to feed the crime.”

One of the speakers at Wednesday’s conference includes a young woman who was trafficked in Iowa. She will be sharing her life story along with her thoughts on how to identify and bring to safety young people who are being trafficked in the state.

Other highlights include: Hearing about actual case studies of human trafficking in Iowa, listening to national experts on child sex and labor trafficking, especially Francis Bok, founder of the Francis Bok Foundation and a former child slave in the Sudan who will be sharing his story and meeting with members of the Taskforce on Human Trafficking from Iowa’s Southern District.

“There are likely hundreds more trafficking victims in our state who have not been identified, and many of our most vulnerable populations are homeless or runaway youth,” Downing-Matibag said.

“Migrant and undocumented workers can also be highly vulnerable to labor trafficking in Iowa, as well as women who come to Iowa as part of the Internet bride industry or some other venue through which men seek wives from less developed countries such as Mexico, South or Southeast Asia, and some countries in Eastern Europe or the former Soviet Union countries.”

By attending the Iowa Conference on Human Trafficking, individuals will become more informed of the human trafficking taking place around them and better equipped to handle human trafficking as it deals with Iowa, the United States and the world.

To register for the conference go to www.iowanaht.org and click on the “click to register” link at the bottom of the page.