BISMARCK, N.D. - The North Dakota Department of Transportation (NDDOT) today announced its participation in a global research collaboration spearheaded by United Against Slavery to fight human trafficking via the 2021 National Outreach Survey for Transportation (NOST). Over 100 contributors including 59 oversight agencies from Canada, Brazil, the Netherlands, and the United States will analyze front-line data from the aviation, maritime, pipeline, railroad, roadway and public transit agencies in an effort to craft policies and solutions to disrupt this criminal activity and ultimately make it difficult, unattractive and unprofitable.

“The NDDOT will be working closely with United Against Slavery to provide them North Dakota-specific data that they’ll be able to use to assess trends, inform training programs and improve enforcement and preventative actions,” said NDDOT Director Bill Panos. “We are grateful to be part of the solution and partner with United Against Slavery to end human trafficking.”

In 2020, United Against Slavery (UAS) became the first-ever recipient of the United States Department of Transportation Combating Human Trafficking in Transportation Impact Award. Christi Wigle, Co-Founder and CEO stated, “The National Outreach Survey for Transportation project launched July 5, 2021 and be open to our collaboration partners for sixty days. The survey tool is designed to collect frontline data on all types of human trafficking to inform research, programming, evaluation, and other functions of the counter-trafficking community. The aggregate findings and data analysis will be completed and disseminated by April 2022 and will guide the collaboration team in crafting global solutions that can help save lives. Our collaborative data collection efforts at United Against Slavery helps victims be freed from enslavement and empowers survivors with the resources needed in their healing journeys.”

To learn more about United Against Slavery and the NOST project, visit www.unitedagainstslavery.org or contact UAS at research@unitedagainstslavery.org.