ICHAD and SMART Africa are thrilled that in August, SMART Africa Global Fellow Laura Bermudez was hired as the Director of Research and Development at the Global Fund to End Modern Slavery (GFEMS). Modeled after the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB, and Malaria, GFEMS is working towards a pooled fund mechanism to direct investments that will tangibly and sustainably reduce modern slavery by making it economically unprofitable. GFEMS is focused on combating the acts of recruiting, harboring, transporting, providing, or obtaining a person for compelled labor or commercial sex acts through the use of force, fraud, or coercion that impacts an estimated 25 million victims globally. Congratulations, Laura, for preventing global modern slavery!