A/HRC/36/46/Add.1 workers to the area has been a dramatic increase in violent crime, generally, and a notable increase in trafficking of Native women and children. 58. Unfortunately, due to the complex legal regime applied to criminal jurisdiction on Indian lands, the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara Nation, like the majority of tribes in the United States, has limited ability to prosecute non-Indian perpetrators of crimes on their lands. In addition, the rapid pace of development quickly and critically overwhelmed the tribe’s existing infrastructure, which was unable to provide law enforcement, victim support and social services to keep pace with the increase in crime on the almost one-million acre reservation. Many residents reported that they felt unsafe in their own homes. At the most basic level, development took place without consideration of the unique communities at Fort Berthold and created an unsafe and unstable environment for families on the reservation. 59. Sadly, this is a pattern that is being repeated in other indigenous communities. With the launch of oil and gas exploration on their territories and evidence of trafficking of Navajo women in and out of their communities, members of the Navajo Nation are deeply concerned about the increase in sexual violence in their territories. 60. While the trafficking of indigenous women and children is hardly a new phenomenon, there is little recognition by public and private stakeholders about affirmative actions that they can take to protect women in communities where energy development catalyzes an increase in sexual violence. According to the preliminary findings of a study funded by Department of Justice 29 that examined the spike in oil development in North Dakota and Montana in relation to domestic and dating violence, sexual assault and stalking, cities near the epicentre of the oil boom showed an increase in the average number of domestic violence victims, with the Bakken region evidencing certain officially reported offences at a rate that was significantly outpaced by population growth. Factors relating to the oil industry that have contributed to the increase in sexual and gender-based violence include the scarcity of affordable housing, the intensity of working hours followed by time off for oil workers who often do not relocate with their families — which leads to separation anxiety for the workers, their partners and the communities —, increased availability of illicit drugs and increased demand for social services that are often unmet by supply. 61. The Special Rapporteur was informed by several interlocutors that oil and gas leasing approvals issued by the Bureau of Indian Affairs do not adequately consider the safety and welfare impacts of extractive industry projects on indigenous women and children. A few minimum steps that corporations should take to ensure the safety of communities in which they are operating would be to ensure that all their employees comply with sex offender registration rules, to provide their workers with adequate housing so as not to create “man camps” that are heavily associated with sex trafficking and illegal prostitution, to provide verifiable addresses to law enforcement and emergency services and to work with the tribes concerned to ensure that local capacity will not be unduly taxed by the short-term influx of workers to the area. Taking these small steps would not only give companies true social licence to operate, but would ultimately establish their conformity with the Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights. 62. The establishment of mechanisms to adequately consider the social values and socioeconomic status of indigenous communities, including the situation of women and girls, would go a long way to increasing their long-term health and well-being. Even a short-term spike in violence against women cuts against the strength and vitality of indigenous communities. That, in turn, exacerbates the experience of historical trauma within families cumulated in part as a result of the largely discriminatory policies of the Government towards indigenous peoples since the first contact, and which, today, still results in distrust of government initiatives. The federal Government and private companies should recognize these patterns and integrate existing frameworks to consider the social 29 Dheeshana S. Jayasundara and others, “Exploratory research on the impact of the growing oil industry in North Dakota and Montana on domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking: a final overview”, University of North Dakota, November 2016. 13