For the fourth consecutive year, Guyana has maintained its Tier 1 ranking for its efforts to combat human trafficking, although the government has been called upon to to implement and train law enforcement officials and front-line responders in written trauma-informed victim identification and referral procedures.
According to the latest United States’ State Department report on Trafficking in Persons (TIP), Guyana and the Bahamas are the only two Caribbean countries to attain the Tier 1 ranking, as most of the other Caribbean countries are on Tier 2, except for Barbados which is on the Tier 2 watchlist.
While Tier 1 is the highest ranking, it does not mean that a country has no human trafficking problems or that it is doing enough to address them. Rather, the ranking, as explained by the report, indicates that a government has made efforts to address the problems that meet the US’ Trafficking Victims Protection Act’s minimum standards. And to maintain the Tier 1 ranking, governments need to demonstrate appreciable progress each year in combatting trafficking.