In March 2014, within the USAID Central Asia Counter Trafficking Project IOM Kazakhstan, in close cooperation with the Public Foundation “Socio-Psychological Rehabilitation and Adaptation Center for women and children “Rodnik” and the State Commission on Women's Affairs, Family and Demographic Policy under the Akim of Almaty city, conducted a seminar on VOT identification, referral and protection in Almaty. The seminar convened a diverse set of participants drawn from the key stakeholders in combating trafficking, such as criminal, administrative and migration police, prosecutors, representatives of city departments of health, education, employment and social programme, NGOs and representatives of embassies, national cultural centers and media.

The main goal of the seminar was educating the stakeholders about human trafficking phenomenon, its scope in Kazakhstan, discussing existing mechanism of identification and referral of victims of trafficking, as well as defining new ways of interaction to identify, refer and provide assistance and protection to victims of trafficking in Almaty city. Experts from IOM and the partner NGO shared knowledge and experiences with other participants. During the concluding session, the moderator provided three stories of victims of trafficking and suggested the participants to develop a scheme how various governmental and non-governmental agencies could cooperate to address the VOT needs. By the end of this interactive session, the participants proposed three draft mechanisms of VOT identification, referral and protection to be used in Almaty. The draft mechanisms were presented to the representative of the State Commission on Women's Affairs, Family and Demographic Policy under the Akim of Almaty city for their consideration.

At the end of the seminar, the participants concluded that there is a need to strengthen and institutionalized collaboration between all stakeholders on identification, referral and protection.

IOM is going to organize similar events in Kokshetau, Petropavlovsk, Shymkent and Karaganda in April – May 2014.