The Unrecognised Intersections Between Climate Change and Modern Slavery
Modern slavery is on the rise. New global estimates of modern slavery published in September 2022 found that almost 50 million people are in modern slavery, a rise of 10 million people since the previous estimates were released in 2017. This increase has been driven by the compounding crises of climate change, the COVID-19 pandemic, and armed […]
Winners of Stop Slavery Award at International Human Rights Forum announced
Apple has been named winner of the Stop Slavery Award, which recognises businesses that have set a gold standard in efforts to eradicate forced labour from their supply chains. The Judging Board agreed that Apple’s supplier responsibility programme ‘is leading in every category’, highlighting the company’s supplier engagement, monitoring and ‘extremely robust’ audit programme, which includes annual audits and […]
Eliminating Modern Slavery and Human Trafficking in Supply Chains
By Norma Tregurtha, Policy & Outreach Director, ISEAL Two years have passed since the UK Government passed the Modern Slavery Act (2015), designed to prevent slavery, servitude, forced or compulsory labour and human trafficking. It is currently estimated that 13,000 men, women and children suffer modern slavery or forced labour in the UK. Globally, an […]
One for All, and All for One: Industry-Level Collaboration is Needed to Eradicate Forced Labour
According to the ILO, nearly 21 million people are subjected to forced labour around the world (an alternative estimate from the Walk Free Foundation, which is working with the ILO to release updated figures this year, puts the number more than twice as high). This activity generates $150 billion in illegal profits every year. 71% […]
Seeing Evidence of Company Action on Modern Slavery
Initiative ETI is recommending that companies place their Modern Slavery Statements in the Business and Human Rights Resource Centre’s Central Registry for Modern Slavery Statements arguing that it provides the only independent, credible, free, open and accessible repository that is accountable to the public interest. In this important blog, Cindy Berman explains why. Go to […]
What Does “Good” Look Like for Companies Trying to Address Modern Slavery?
As the UN Forum on Business and Human Rights opens today in Geneva, Quintin Lake, Research Fellow at Hult International Business School, discusses modern slavery. Addressing modern slavery is becoming a business-critical for companies – for credibility with customers, investors, NGOs and the public – according to new research by Hult International Business School and […]
Tackling Slavery in Supply Chains – What Can We Do?
The ILO estimates that there are approximately 21 million people enslaved around the world at present – these will include many people who are in bonded labour, those trafficked and kept against their will in enslaved situations – but slavery also exists in global supply chains. Modern Slavery can also take the form of exploitation […]
Obama Unshackles Slavery Ban
In 1938 President Franklin Delano Roosevelt effectively ended child labour in the United States by prohibiting its use in interstate commerce. He couldn’t outlaw the use of child labour in production because working age laws are determined at the state level. So he solved the problem in a realm he did control: trade. In 2016 […]
The Problem with Slavery and the SDGs
The inclusion of slavery eradication in the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is recognition by the international community that, until now, many of the world’s poorest people had been comprehensively ignored in the wider struggle to end poverty. That is a fact confirmed by the number 5.5 million, the International Labour Organization’s most recent […]