The Exodus Road (TER) is a non-governmental 501(c)(3) organization that works to combat human trafficking through prevention, intervention, and aftercare programs.
[1] In 2010, co-founders Matt and Laura Parker moved their family from Colorado to Thailand to direct a children's home, where they were exposed to the issue of human trafficking and began networking with counter-trafficking NGOs and local law enforcement involved in intervention work.
The Exodus Road is governed by an International Advisory Board composed of leaders in the anti-human trafficking field from the United States, Southeast Asia, and Latin America.
[10] While Matt and Laura Parker are strongly motivated by their Christian faith and some of their partners are faith-based, TER’s 501(c)(3) registration status is without religious affiliation.
[12] TraffickWatch Academy is an initiative of The Exodus Road that features a digital training platform designed to equip law enforcement, leaders, and citizens in the fight against human trafficking.
[14] The multimedia modules share survivor stories based on case files from the nonprofit’s operations and provides practical steps for viewers to personally combat trafficking in their communities.
In partnership with the government of Amazonas, TER developed a specialized, in-depth version of TraffickWatch Academy to provide thousands of civil police with counter-trafficking training in Brazil.
[17] David Zach, lead vocalist and guitarist of the Christian rock band Remedy Drive, has been on several deployments with the organization's DELTA Team.
[22] The Exodus Road received a $60,000 grant to support their Freedom Home project in Thailand from the UN Voluntary Trust Fund for Victims of Human Trafficking (UNVTF), managed by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).
[32] The Exodus Road has also been criticized for being religiously influenced to use trafficking as a pretext to intervene against sex workers and remove their sources of income.
[34] Specifically, TER functions under the United Nations' definition of human trafficking: "recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring or receipt of people through force, fraud or deception, with the aim of exploiting them for profit.