Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children (CSEC) in Coastal Kenya

Kenya is a source, transit, and destination country for commercial sexual exploitation of children (CSEC). Despite continued efforts on the part of the Kenyan government to eliminate CSEC and other forms of trafficking in persons, Kenya continues to rank a Tier 2 country in the U.S. State Department’s Trafficking in Persons report due to uneven prosecution of perpetrators and inadequate social protections for survivors.

The Global Fund commissioned NORC at the University of Chicago to End Modern Slavery (GFEMS) to lead an independent research study to obtain time 2 (2022) estimates of the count of CSEC victims/survivors in Kilifi and Kwale counties, known hotspots for child trafficking in Kenya. Employing the same methodological approach used to obtain time 1 estimates (2021), this study revealed an estimated 2,426 children in Kilifi and Kwale are currently engaged in CSEC, accounting for nearly 1 percent of the total population of 13- to 17-year-olds in the two counties. While the overall CSEC prevalence rate dropped from 1.7 percent in 2021 to 0.8 percent in 2022, findings also show over 60 percent of CSEC victims are likely suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and children continue to play an important role in perpetuating the cycle of child sex trafficking.

For more key findings, download the brief.