Comfort Monayonnoh Gray is an entrepreneur, humanitarian, and founder/executive director of Women and Children's Shelter, a local nonprofit. She has a BA in Sociology and an MA in Conflict Transformation and Peace Studies. Additionally, Comfort organizes trainings that help community members build up their life skills.

IVLP Impact Award Project: Drawing People's Attention to Issues Surrounding Trafficking in Person

Comfort's project raised awareness about the dangers associated with human-trafficking in Bong County and Montserrado County, Liberia, working to safeguard children in her community in particular. Through 12 meetings, participants learned the importance of tracing human trafficking instances and how develop a contact tracing mechanism to trace some of those children who may have been exposed to human trafficking. Comfort's project had a lasting impact by partnering with community stakeholders to make it a locally based initiative that included every sector and promoted the idea that human trafficking is everybody's problem, and can only be addressed through collective contribution.

15 community ambassadors were trained in each county to monitor child movement and human trafficking. The ambassadors are expected to work with local leaders to report human trafficking and identify community structures that can be improved to safeguard community members. Through this approach, the project also helped better the community's relationship with local and state authorities. 

In total, all 12 meetings had over 450 participants and the meeting information was shared with over 1,000 people via radio and television features.  

"The project hopes to clearly make known TIP Policies and law." - Comfort Monayonnoh Gray

IVLP Exchange Experience 

Comfort was a participant in the IVLP Project Combating Trafficking in Persons organized by the U.S. Department of State and Meridian International Center.

Comfort's exchange experience led to the development of her IVLP Impact Award Project: "I saw the people of the United States combating Human Trafficking as a national problem. The project intends to bring that same expert approach to the people of Liberia."

U.S. Communities Visited

Washington, DC; Atlanta, GA; Minneapolis, MN

Country: Liberia

Click here to go back to the IVLP Impact Awards Main Page