Dar es Salaam—On any given day, the bustling streets of Tanzania’s commercial capital are filled with young faces. Barefoot boys dart between cars, hawking plastic wares or wiping windshields. Teenage girls, some barely older than ten, loiter at street corners, their expressions hollow. While many Tanzanians dismiss them as street kids or runaways, the truth is far darker—a vast, organised network of human trafficking has turned children into commodities.
Bato, a 13-year-old orphan from Kigoma, recalls how his nightmare began. “A man found me at the bus stand. He said he’d raise me as his son and take me to Dar es Salaam for a better life,” Bato says, his voice subdued. What awaited him, however, was far from the promise of care.
Instead, he found himself crammed into a small, windowless room with eight other boys. They slept on “mkeka”—traditional mats on the floor—without electricity or proper food. Every morning, they were dispatched into the city to sell plastic home goods. For Bato, this meant long days under the scorching sun and harsh punishments for missed sales targets.
“If I fail to sell enough, I’m beaten,” he explains. “At night, I eat only if I’ve met the target.” His “boss” pays him a paltry 10,000 Tanzanian shillings ($4) a month—a sum barely enough for basic needs.
Bato is one of thousands of children in Tanzania ensnared in human trafficking networks that exploit their vulnerability. From Kigoma to Iringa, poverty-stricken regions serve as recruitment grounds for traffickers, who lure families with promises of opportunity.

Human trafficking in Tanzania operates like a shadow economy, thriving on secrecy and collusion. Rural recruiters promise parents and guardians a brighter future for their children: education, employment, and urban comforts. Once in the city, however, these promises evaporate. Middlemen distribute trafficked youth into various exploitative roles: street hawkers, beggars, petty criminals, and even sex workers.
Many of the victims live in fear of speaking out and even appealed to this reporter not to use their names. One of them is Gwantwa (not her real name), a 17-year-old girl from Iringa.
“They told me I’d work for a rich family as a housemaid and earn a good salary,” recalls Iringa. Upon arriving in Dar es Salaam, she found herself trapped in a brothel alongside 16 other girls—some as young as nine.
“We live together in a crowded house under Auntie’s rules. She brings us clients, decides the price, and gives us one meal a day. If we complain, we’re beaten,” Gwantwa says, her voice trembling. She describes nights of brutal abuse by drunk, older men and days spent dreading sexually transmitted diseases.
“I’m a slave in my own country,” she says. “When I hear politicians say Tanzania is free, I get angry. How can we call this freedom?”
The Faces of Exploitation
In places like Mbagala, Buguruni, Tandale, and Mwananyamala—Dar es Salaam’s poorest neighborhoods—children live in plain sight but remain invisible to society. They are hawkers, beggars, or worse, victims of organized prostitution and crime rings. Physical disabilities do not exempt anyone from exploitation.
Anna (not her real name), a 14-year-old girl with impaired legs, works as a beggar at Karume market. Her handler pushes her wheelchair through the crowded streets, collecting money from sympathetic passersby.
“I hand over all the money to my handler. My mother agreed to this deal—they send her 150,000 Tanzanian shillings ($55) a month,” Anna says, tears welling up. She is among seven other underage girls with disabilities crammed into a Buguruni room without beds, proper food, or medication. She works 14-hour days under constant threat.
“I lost my right to education. My childhood was stolen,” Anna says softly. “What hurts most is that my mother is part of this.”

The roots of Tanzania’s human trafficking crisis lie in poverty, weak enforcement, and systemic neglect. In upcountry regions like Kigoma, Iringa, Singida, and Mwanza, parents desperate to escape economic hardship willingly hand over their children to traffickers. These recruiters—often neighbors or trusted community members—are the first link in a chain that extends to urban buyers, corrupt law enforcement, and exploitative bosses.
According to the 2023 US Trafficking in Persons Report, the Tanzanian government significantly increased dedicated funding for the Anti-Trafficking Secretariat (ATS) and anti-trafficking activities to implement the 2021-2024 national action plan (NAP).
In 2021, Tanzania introduced the National Action Plan to Combat Trafficking in Persons, which aimed to strengthen the country’s efforts to address human trafficking. Building on this, a 2022 legal amendment was enacted to enhance the investigation of trafficking cases, improve the identification of victims of human trafficking, and foster coordination with local and international organisations to provide advanced training for government officers.
These measures propelled Tanzania to Tier 2 in the U.S. 2022 Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report. But beneath this achievement lies a sobering truth: traffickers continue to exploit the vulnerable, and the path to eradicating this crime remains fraught with challenges.
At the heart of this issue are Tanzania’s most defenseless—children from impoverished, rural families. In the Mwanza region, WoteSawa, a local non-governmental organisation, has been on the frontlines of this fight. Between 2022 and 2024, the organisation rescued 53 girls from the clutches of traffickers. These victims hailed from three Tanzanian regions—Mwanza, Kagera, and Kigoma—but the stories of despair stretch beyond the country’s borders. Among the rescued, 29 victims were children trafficked from neighboring Burundi.
Ken Heril, a Senior Project Associate with the International Organization for Migration, does not mince words when discussing the issue. “Human trafficking is real,” he says, his tone both resolute and urgent. “Addressing it requires a coordinated effort—from families and communities to stakeholders and the government.”
Heril praised Tanzania’s strides in tackling the issue, crediting these efforts for the country’s improved ranking in the TIP Report. “The move from the watchlist to Tier 2 is evidence of the government’s commitment,” he said. But he was quick to point out that the work is far from over.
Mr. Seperatus Fella, Secretary for the Ministry of Home Affairs Secretariat for Anti-Human Trafficking, echoed Heril’s sentiments. He cited anecdotal evidence revealing that six children are rescued from trafficking every month.
“This fight is wide and complicated,” he admitted. “Many cases involve victims trafficked from Burundi, which adds an international dimension to our efforts.”
To address this cross-border challenge, Tanzania and Burundi have established Joint Anti-Human Trafficking meetings, fostering collaboration and shared solutions. “These meetings are critical,” Fella emphasised. “They allow us to discuss the plight of the victims and strategise on how to protect them.”
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This report was produced as part of the Liberalist Centre’s Journalism for Liberty Fellowship project with funding support from Atlas Network.