Because of poverty

CHEERS TO VERA Files for their story “akyat barko girls (ship climbing girls)”, prostitutes who climb docked ships to offer sex to foreign ship crews.

“Women who climb ships” was posted on June 7, the story featured akyat barko girls, who according to Talikala, an organization in Davao that provides training and counseling to women and girls forced into the sex trade, most of whom have had only a high school or elementary education and whose ages range from 13 to 26.

Talikala estimates that there are between 300 and 400 akyat barko girls. Most of the girls interviewed came from a broken family. Other akyat barko girls said  their families were also involved in  prostitution, their siblings and mother being akyat barko girls themselves.

The story showed how extreme poverty forces women to sell their bodies in exchange for money even at the risk of their lives. Some akyat barko girls, according to those interviewed, had been physically abused or even killed.