The age at which young women should be allowed to become prostitutes should be raised from 18 to 23, according to Amsterdam city council executive Lodewijk Asscher.

And Asscher wants the city’s famous red light district to be prostitution-free between 4am and 8am, so that efforts can be focused during the day on tracking down pimps and human traffickers.
’18-year-old girls from Bulgaria, Romania and Hungary are extremely vulnerable. They are brought here but they are unable to resist the pressure. Women of 23 are more adult, more resistant,’ Asscher is quoted as saying in Tuesday’s Telegraaf.
Asscher also says that prostitutes should have to register as freelancers with the local chamber of commerce and prove that they can speak Dutch, or at least English, Spanish or French.
‘Amsterdam is an international city and prostitution is part of that,’ he told the paper. ‘And there is nothing against it, if it is done out of free will. But unfortunately we see many instances where this is not the case.’
The city council launched major clean up of the city centre red light district in 2008 with the aim of cutting back on crime and forced prostitution, and taking the area more upmarket.