Published figure

6.3 million

People in forced commercial sexual exploitation on any given day. Almost four in five are women or girls.

What this number is

This is a stock estimate — how many people were in forced commercial sexual exploitation on a typical day in 2021, not how many were newly trafficked that year. The same report puts total modern slavery at about 50 million people worldwide, of which forced commercial sexual exploitation is one slice of forced labour.

Caveats

It is a modelled estimate, not a census. It cannot tell you who is in a given city tonight, and it is not a children-rescued-per-dollar conversion rate. Almost four in five of these people are women or girls; that is a gender split, not a claim that men and boys are absent.

What the 90% is for

Correctional’s 90% is meant for organizations that can house, treat, represent, and keep contact with people in this population — especially children in commercial sexual exploitation. The pledge does not “buy 6.3 million rescues.” It funds the scarce follow-up that turns a removal into something that lasts.