The Consumer Goods Forum moved in a timely way when integrating the Global Social Compliance Programme into its structures and work. The GSCP sustainability toolbox had been completed and the convergence-driving equivalence process was well established. Emphasis needed to be shifted to new things.
Taking up the challenge of forced labour in global supply chains was both bold and ambitious and sends a signal about how serious the approach is. When the joint CGF effort takes off it can again prove that voluntary private sector initiatives can effectively defend and support human rights and promote decent work in the globalised economy. As a member of the Advisory Board, I am pleased that GSCP was given the task of initiating and helping to launch this work. It does show the success of our common initiative.
When I was invited to bring the trade unions into this newly formed sustainability platform my first reaction was rather reserved. There was this group of leading multinational retailers and they had already developed a code and set a work programme. Would we really be able to influence, or be there just to give credibility to big business?
My discussions with the founding companies, particularly Carrefour at that time, convinced me that changes and adjustments would be made so that we could come on board.
This was not a self-evident decision for UNI Commerce. Some of the GSCP companies were engaged in serious labour conflicts with our affiliates – how could we work side by side with them without weakening the union positions? What about the right to form trade unions and conclude collective agreements?
My view was – and still is – that industrial country employers and trade unions cannot act out on their disagreements or labour conflicts at the expense of workers and their families in supplier regions. This would be both immoral and unethical. We have a shared responsibility for supporting human rights and decent working conditions in countries that cannot or will not do it on their own.
Maybe my own Nordic background where seeking social dialogue and partnership plays a central role for my conviction that we should join. Thus I was pleased and even impressed that the UNI Commerce unions agreed and decided to set out on the joint voyage.
Our work on the Reference Code as well as the other parts of the unique GSCP sustainability toolbox was always marked by a genuine will from all participants to find the best and most effective approaches to defining what good looks like and how it can best be promoted in the global supply chains.
Today’s labour relations climate is harder than when we built up GSCP together. Instead of sharing the results of growth employers and unions deal with paying the costs of shrinking economies. This has also affected sustainability work.
Global unions have downgraded or even ended their participation in many schemes and initiatives. They are openly questioning social audits and voluntary programmes, calling for more legislation instead. For this, they have formed new alliances with militant social advocacy organisations. We have indeed witnessed something of a collapse of broad multi-stakeholder cooperation on social sustainability in global supply chains.
At the ILO International Labour Conference in June this year we could see the divides. Unions and their NGO allies were pushing for a new binding Labour Convention while employers denied that there were governance problems or any need for new regulations. The end result was largely non-committal as could be expected and discussions about a possible new Convention continue.
Many unions and advocacy organisations hope that the UN Guiding Principles for Business and Human Rights would be applied through binding legislation in the home countries of buyer companies. I have seen this clearly also through my participation in Germany’s Textile Alliance.
With governments unwilling to put their own business sectors at disadvantage, this will not happen. Also from a development point of view increased risks for sanctions – also for unintended issues – could lead brands and retailers to leave some of the least developed countries where the need for a foreign economic involvement may be biggest. I am convinced that respecting the UN and OECD due diligence obligations will continue to rely largely on voluntary corporate responsibility schemes and initiatives.
I do understand the NGO and union frustrations over what they feel is an all too slow pace of positive changes through audit based initiatives. Still I think that much of the criticism is unfair, maybe also driven by their own organisational interests. The projects that they have developed themselves are highly supportable and can be useful as best practice examples, but too narrow both to substance and coverage to make a real difference for the total supply chain picture.
Both buyer companies and sustainability schemes have done much to support human rights and decent working conditions in global supply chains. GSCP has played a major role in moving emphasis from audit reports to improving labour conditions. Both capacity building and remediation has grown, most of it enabled by the buyer community.
Social auditing continues to be an essential part of this work. GSCP has done much to support the auditing industry in its efforts to secure audit quality and reliability and this work now continues in the new Association of Professional Social Compliance Auditors. I have joined the APSCA Stakeholder Board together with representatives of some of the CGF member companies, a further sign of these links.
Approaching the forced labour issues through joint activities does not mean that the CGF, GSCP or member companies would abandon the rest of their agenda. Driving convergence of social sustainability work at a high and demanding level remains essential if we want real and positive changes to take place in the supply chains.
Very much is already being done, but regrettably much of it outside the public eye. While brands and retailers are very skilled in marketing their products they are much less active in telling about their own sustainability work. Here, both the CGF and GSCP should pay much attention to transparency and reporting. The work to eradicate forced labour will give a good opportunity to do this and thus also draw attention to the need for broad public-private cooperation to defend human rights at work.