Deadline: 31-Mar-23
The Human Trafficking Research Initiative (HTRI) invites proposals from researchers and organizations that intend to design and carry out studies on how to reduce human trafficking or respond to the needs of human trafficking victims but need some additional time and support to push the research project to the next stage.
To generate a more expansive pool of high-quality research proposals focused on human trafficking, in this funding round, Innovations for Poverty Actions (IPA) seeks to support early-stage activities to develop partnerships, carry out exploratory research, and demonstrate the feasibility of larger-scale studies evaluating the effectiveness of current or planned counter-trafficking interventions.
The objective of these small grants, ranging between $10,000 and $50,000, is to advance early-stage discussion between researchers and implementing organizations to the point where they have viable research project designs and plans that can lead to a full impact evaluation in the future.
Focus Areas
All research grants must focus on one or both forms of trafficking in persons as defined by the Trafficking Victim Protection Act:
- Sex Trafficking – when a trafficker uses force, fraud, or coercion to compel a person to engage in a commercial sex act or when a trafficker causes a child who has not attained 18 years of age to engage in a commercial sex act.
- Forced Labor – when a trafficker recruits, harbors, transports, provides, or obtains a person for labor or services by using force, fraud, or coercion.
Funding Information
In this round, the HTRI will consider proposals that include:
- Small research pilots of promising interventions: These are grants that would fund the cost of a small pilot to assess the feasibility and value of a larger research project. These grants are intended to be the first step of formal research for promising interventions and anti-trafficking activities. Programs with monitoring and evaluation data, administrative data, and/or sound theories of change that indicate promising impact would be a good fit for this grant. They anticipate funding between $10,000 to $50,000 per pilot.
- Seed money for a travel grant or staff time to build on nascent research ideas: These grants are to develop preliminary research ideas and help researchers develop subsequent proposals for pilots or full randomized evaluations. Activities may include travel, relationship development, descriptive analysis, observational analysis, and data development or collection. These grants are primarily meant for junior faculty, PhD students, and other researchers who do not have other sources of funding for travel and exploratory work. They anticipate funding between $10,000 and $15,000 per award.
- Small grants for data work using existing sources to examine program impact: These are small grants that will support researchers to use a partner’s administrative data or other existing data sets, conduct desk research to deepen previous research analysis, or create new analysis to help inform research project design and viability. They expect to see applications either explain how existing analysis could be improved or potentially be used to draw additional conclusions. Preference will be given to applicants who chart how their results can influence future research (specifically impact evaluations). They anticipate funding awards of up to $10,000.
Geographic Focus
- All projects must benefit people and communities for lower- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Please note that project activities and interventions can take place anywhere, but the intended beneficiaries must be from LMICs. HTRI is funded by the Program to End Modern Slavery (PEMS) in the U.S. Department of State’s Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons.
- Given current PEMS investments in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, HTRI will pay special attention to applications that benefit the people of the following countries: Bangladesh, Brazil, Costa Rica, Ethiopia, India, Kenya, Morocco, Malawi, Nigeria, Pakistan, Senegal, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Tanzania, Tunisia, and Zambia
Eligibility Criteria
- All researchers must meet the terms of the U.S. Department of State’s Office to Combat Trafficking in Persons eligibility requirements.
- Researchers must either hold a PhD or be currently pursuing a PhD in a relevant social science discipline. Applications that do not include at least one researcher actively pursuing or holding a PhD will be disqualified. Teams should include at least one member with demonstrated experience in field research and randomized evaluations. Researchers should also have knowledge and/or expertise in human trafficking or adjacent fields.
- The Human Trafficking Research Initiative will give preference to underrepresented researchers in the field. They encourage applications from minority researchers, such as women, junior scholars, firstgeneration college graduates, and citizens of lower- or middle-income countries. Local researchers and local organizations are necessary for the success of many human trafficking programs and assessments; this will be incorporated into their proposal assessment.
For more information, visit Human Trafficking Research Initiative.