IRIN
Andoany, 26 November 2010 (IRIN) - Community-based resistance to sex tourism on Nosy Be, an island off the northwest coast of Madagascar and its busiest resort, is holding the line against child sex work, but the country’s declining economic fortunes are making a tough fight even tougher.
Officially, the population of Nosy Be is 109,000, of which 12 people are HIV positive; unofficially, no one really knows to what extent migrating sex workers have increased the numbers.
"Girls from all 22 regions [of Madagascar] come here because of tourism and the opportunity to have a white husband," Jean Claude de Bikiny, the island's deputy administrator, told IRIN. "We have been fighting this problem [sex tourism] since 1990."
He thought about eight percent of people on Nosy Be could be sex workers, but this probably ebbed and flowed in synch with the high and low tourism seasons. There are frequent and direct flights from Europe to the 300 sq km island, and regular ferries cover the 8km distance from Madagascar.
According to UNAIDS about 0.2 percent of the sexually active population are infected with HIV/AIDS, in a country with about 20 million people.
"Twenty years ago it was unimaginable that women would become prostitutes," Antoinette Djaotoly, an educator at Foyer Social, a community-based training centre in the Nosy Be capital Andoany - formerly Hellville - told IRIN. The centre provides training in life skills and a variety of trades, from manicurist to car mechanic, enabling sex workers to seek alternative employment.
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Andoany, 26 November 2010 (IRIN) - Community-based resistance to sex tourism on Nosy Be, an island off the northwest coast of Madagascar and its busiest resort, is holding the line against child sex work, but the country’s declining economic fortunes are making a tough fight even tougher.
Officially, the population of Nosy Be is 109,000, of which 12 people are HIV positive; unofficially, no one really knows to what extent migrating sex workers have increased the numbers.
"Girls from all 22 regions [of Madagascar] come here because of tourism and the opportunity to have a white husband," Jean Claude de Bikiny, the island's deputy administrator, told IRIN. "We have been fighting this problem [sex tourism] since 1990."
He thought about eight percent of people on Nosy Be could be sex workers, but this probably ebbed and flowed in synch with the high and low tourism seasons. There are frequent and direct flights from Europe to the 300 sq km island, and regular ferries cover the 8km distance from Madagascar.
According to UNAIDS about 0.2 percent of the sexually active population are infected with HIV/AIDS, in a country with about 20 million people.
"Twenty years ago it was unimaginable that women would become prostitutes," Antoinette Djaotoly, an educator at Foyer Social, a community-based training centre in the Nosy Be capital Andoany - formerly Hellville - told IRIN. The centre provides training in life skills and a variety of trades, from manicurist to car mechanic, enabling sex workers to seek alternative employment.
Read more...