Since January 2016, about 3,600 girls and women have arrived in Italy from Nigeria, and more than 80% of them are being trafficked into prostitution, according to figures from the UN’s International Office for Migration (IOM). Annie Kelly and Lorenzo Tondo reveal the unprecedented numbers of women being preyed on by trafficking networks. Abused and vulnerable, these women have a champion in Princess Okokon, who was herself trafficked from Nigeria in 1999, and has since helped hundreds of women to escape from forced prostitution in Italy – our video shows her working with women in Asti and Sicily. Spanish photographer Quintina Valero shares stories and portraits of women helped by Okokon’s NGO to escape the sex trade.
As the Olympic Games began in Rio, three young journalists from the favelas – Daiene Mendes, Thaís Cavalcante and Michel Silva, look back on life in their communities over the last 12 months – a time of repression and increased violence. In our video, Mendes says she is now used to the constant sound of gunfire. “We ask for peace, but all we receive is war.” And amid complaints of pollution and sanitation problems in Guanabara Bay, John Vidal looks at why the city is finding it so hard to clear up its waste, as it grapples with industrialisation, population growth and lack of money.
Elsewhere on the site
Thailand: poultry workers ‘slept on floor next to 28,000 birds’
Paraguayans lose faith in justice system over land rights
Ugandan farmers seal grain deal with Kenyan firms
Women in South Sudan raped under nose of UN
Hissène Habré ordered to pay millions for crimes against humanity
Women vow to fight on in Peru over forced sterilisations
The app that helps aid workers
Dirty water muddies future for Madagascar’s children
Opinion
Girls learning to swim in Zanzibar: ‘I feel powerful and free’ – Sita Hai Simai
Students Speak: the Rio Games come at a cost to Brazil’s poorest
Philip Morris v Uruguay: who really won? – Cecilia Olivet and Alberto Villareal
If companies profit by doing good, why aren’t they all doing it? – Jonathan Glennie
Multimedia
Surviving on seeds after failed harvests in Chad – in pictures
The child labourers helping luxury cars sparkle – video
Fear in Rio’s favelas: ‘My ears are used to the gunshots’ – video
Obama’s ambition of an Aids-free generation is a pipe dream – podcast
Africa and the tech revolution – podcast
Sri Lanka’s women ensure mangroves and incomes flourish – in pictures
Ethiopia’s safe houses for violence survivors – in pictures
What you said
On Africa and the tech revolution, Juliet Hephzibah wrote:
Most people still see a picture of Africa where children are malnourished, families are living on less than a dollar a day, disease-ravaged people – all dire situations that need assistance. Let’s stop and reflect on what empowerment through technology can do to the lives of Africans: African solutions developed by Africans. I suggest that we are better off focusing on developing solutions to address problems, rather than painting the same cliched images. These are what create stereotypes, as Chimamanda [Ngozi Adichie] said in the “Danger of the single story”.
Highlight from the blogosphere
For Humanosphere, Lisa Nikolau says that a Gallup survey shows that civilians in Venezuela and El Salvador report feeling more insecure and unsafe than people from Syria and Afghanistan.
And finally …
Poverty matters will return in two weeks with another roundup of the latest news and comment. In the meantime, keep up to date on the Global development website. Follow @gdndevelopment and @LizFordGuardian on Twitter, and join Guardian Global development on Facebook.
