Updated July 10, There are fears the mining boom is leading to an increase in the exploitation of women in the sex industry. Increasingly, sex workers are travelling to Australia's remote mining communities hoping to cash in on the lonely, mostly male workforce. Mount Isa Mines, in the remote north-west corner of Queensland, has been operating for almost 90 years.
The surrounding city has grown steadily over time as more and more people chase the huge salaries on offer in the resources sector. But local police officer Inspector Paul Biggin says while sex workers have also been a major beneficiary of the boom, there are growing concerns about women being brought in from overseas and exploited by criminals.
Inspector Biggin said while the numbers of women are hard to quantify, many are coming from Asia. That's evidenced through research and obviously operationally. Inspector Biggin has been awarded the Donald Mackay Churchill Fellowship, allowing him to travel overseas and meet with international sex trafficking experts.
He is hoping to learn more about strategies to empower women who are being exploited in mining communities. However, Jules Kim, the migration project manager at Scarlet Alliance, said it was "very dangerous" to use those as indicators of exploitation. I think there has been a lot of hype-up about that at the moment. Topics: prostitution , police , mining-industry , rural , qld , mount-isa , longreach , mackay , rockhampton , toowoomba First posted July 10, More stories from Queensland.
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