Safe futures is an initiative supported by the European Union Drugs Agency to strengthen shared understanding of, and responses to, the recruitment and exploitation of young people into criminal drugs networks across Europe. The initiative responds to growing concern that organised drug crime increasingly relies on young people, often those experiencing the greatest vulnerability, as labour in drug supply activities and associated violence, creating an interlinked security, social and public health challenge requiring coordinated, evidence-informed action.

This report emphasises the research needs and priorities emerging from the first 12 months of the safe futures initiative (March 2025–March 2026). It uses a narrative synthesis approach drawing on (1) key documents collated during year one (including the safe futures rapid evidence review (in print), comparative systematic reviews, policy recommendations and technical reports); and (2) learning generated through four multijurisdictional community of practice events. The analysis focuses on research gaps explicitly stated or strongly implied in these sources, including data and indicator limitations, scarcity of robust evaluations, needs for longitudinal evidence, and implementation barriers and facilitators.

Across the evidence base, youth recruitment into drug markets is shown to be multilevel and dynamic, shaped by adversity and trauma, peer/family and network influences, neighbourhood disadvantage and a rapidly evolving digital environment enabling grooming and tasking. Recruitment occurs through multiple mechanisms (e.g. active recruitment, ‘growing into’ networks, and coercive tactics such as intimidation and debt bondage), and is increasingly mediated through social media and encrypted messaging, blurring lines between friendship, opportunity and exploitation. The report suggests that evidence on ‘what works’ remains fragmented and methodologically limited, especially in European contexts, with few evaluated interventions and thin evidence on effective online counter-recruitment approaches. This makes simple ‘off-the-shelf’ transfer between jurisdictions unreliable.

The central implication is the need for a design-led, implementation-aware research and programme agenda that supports co-design, prototyping, testing and refinement of interventions in real-world settings, while strengthening the learning structures that enable adaptation across diverse contexts. To operationalise this, the report sets out five policy-relevant recommendations: (1) build comparable definitions, core indicators and local monitoring partnerships; (2) coordinate a design-led, co-produced intervention pilot with clear theories of change and learning loops; (3) invest in longitudinal and prospective research to understand recruitment mechanisms, timing and ‘dosage’ of interventions; (4) make implementation tracking a core research target (information sharing, early identification and ‘reachable’ service pathways); and (5) develop a bespoke EU-wide evaluation and shared learning infrastructure.