Detained Sen. Leila de Lima has called on the Senate to look into the rising number of young Filipino women who are signing up for a controversial dating website allegedly to help finance their needs during the COVID-19 pandemic.

De Lima said it is time that the Senate investigates this growing trend called “sugar dating” in the Philippines and the surge in popularity of potentially exploitative websites that are luring young women seeking alternative sources of income in exchange for favors that are “mostly sexual in nature.”

With unemployment skyrocketing due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the senator noted many Filipinos are now forced to find questionable means to provide for their families due to the present shortage of legitimate job opportunities.

Some young women, she noted, are especially forced into finding alternative means of livelihood, regardless of the moral issues involved.

“One such alternative means of livelihood is ‘sugar dating.’ It is defined as a transactional dating practice typically characterized by an older, wealthier person and a younger person in need of financial assistance in a mutually beneficial relationship,” De Lima said in the explanatory note of her Senate Resolution No. 609.

“Under this arrangement, the ‘sugar baby’ is given financial assistance by a ‘sugar daddy/mommy’ in exchange for companionship and other favors which are mostly sexual in nature,” she pointed out.

The lawmaker said a number of women allegedly joined the “Sugarbook” website with the fervent hope of alleviating their current situations.

Citing reports, she said there has been a 63 percent surge in sign-ups and 79 percent of them were “sugar babies” from March to August 2020 or during the height of the enhanced community quarantine or ECQ in the country.

The dating site registered the largest number of Filipino users in the National Capital Region (NCR) where 12,450 of them are sugar babies while 4,507 are “sugar daddies.”

Central Visayas followed suit, followed closely by Central Luzon and the Davao region. De Lima said it was found that majority of the registered sugar babies are students.

De Lima said women’s rights advocates and legal experts have likened the business model of sugar dating sites to the concept of prostitution by “exploiting the vulnerabilities of women, particularly young women.”

Under Republic Act No. 9208, or the Anti-Trafficking in Persons Act of 2003, prostitution is punishable by law, the former Commission on Human Rights (CHR) chief said.

“There is need to examine the underlying conditions in our populations that render them vulnerable to exploitation by these kinds of website that prey on women, even minors, who are in desperate need of financial assistance,” she said.

Aside from preventing further proliferation of abuse and exploitation of young women, the former Justice Secretary also stressed the necessity to safeguard vulnerable sectors and effectively address the employment needs and concerns of Filipinos for them to obtain their most productive capacity and help them contribution to national development.

“It is, likewise, necessary to investigate these alleged cases of abuse and exploitation and gather more concrete data regarding this emerging industry in order to protect women’s and children’s rights amid the looming effects of a global health crisis,” she stressed.