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Maplecroft highlights resources for companies to address child labour issues in the wake of ILO awareness day – free poster available

16/06/2011

In response to the International Labour Organisation’s (ILO) World Day Against Child Labour on Sunday 12 June, Maplecroft is highlighting a range of freely available resources, including the Human Rights and Business Dilemmas Forum and Girls Discovered websites, which have been developed to help multinational corporations identify and address child labour risks and responsibilities in their operations and supply chains. Maplecroft is also offering a free poster of its Child Labour Index to all trial users and subscribers to the Global Risks Portfolio.

The Child Labour Index forms part of Maplecroft’s Human Rights Risk Atlas and highlights child labour risks for business throughout all regions of the world and all stages of operation, supply and distribution so that business can navigate these risks responsibly. It measures the prevalence and type of child labour, as well as government efforts to combat child labour, across 196 countries. The poster provides risk managers, auditors and compliance specialists with an instant, top level guide to assess child labour worldwide.

Maplecroft’s work on child labour also extends to the Human Rights and Business Dilemmas Forum, a free web resource it jointly produces with the UN Global Compact with funding from the GE Foundation. The Forum has an entire section on child labour with a large bank of easily accessible resources for companies to draw on. Ongoing dialogue of human rights issues, including child labour, is also available on the Forum, where practitioners can debate and discuss the inherent risks and responsibilities facing business. Forum resources include the dilemmas corporations face when confronted with child labour in emerging markets. However, more importantly it offers suggestions for business and case studies of how business has responsibly addressed the issue.

The main question for multinationals is how do they responsibly address the presence of child labour in their supply chains and operations? This is particularly relevant to regions in which child labour is prevalent, such as the emerging markets, where removing income from children could push families into deeper poverty and children into other forms of exploitation?

“The elimination of child labour in supply chains is important for business operations as it decreases reputational and legal risks of companies being complicit in human rights abuses,” said Monique Bianchi, Principal Human Rights Analyst at Maplecroft. “It is also important to do this responsibly, in order to move children out of the supply chain and into education, ensuring that they have better opportunities in the future to move out of the poverty cycle.”

Maplecroft's Child Labour Index 2011

Download poster (available to trial users and subscribers of the Global Risks Portfolio)

Responsible management and the formulation of innovative strategies to cope with child labour dilemmas can support the right to childhood and primary education. Real world examples of dilemmas on the Forum, along with case studies, outline positive responses to child labour by multinational corporations, which can be used by peers as the basis for their own initiatives.

For instance, IKEA, the multinational retailer, has hired a Children’s Ombudsmen to oversee all aspects of its work with children. IKEA holds workshops for suppliers on a wide range of issues, including child labour and is partnering with UNICEF to combat child labour in the carpet-producing area of India, Uttar Pradesh. As a result of the project, more than 80,000 children have enrolled in schools.

The clothing retailer, H&M has also initiated projects to combat child labour. Together with UNICEF, H&M has launched a five-year initiative to focus on the rights of children in cotton-producing regions of Southern India. H&M has donated US$45 million to rehabilitate child workers by providing them with educational opportunities and access to better health care and nutrition.

Another approach has been offered by M&S which, under its pillar on ‘fair partnership’, has committed to a number of ethical trade and labour standard commitments to assist in the elimination of child labour in the supply chain. By the 2009/10, the company had extended its use of Fairtrade certified products and purchased approximately a third of the world’s Fairtrade cotton; it increased Fairtrade food sales by 55% from 2006/7 and sold 7.9 million Fairtrade cotton garments; and it assisted its suppliers to develop six ethical model factories to identify and share best practice.

Maplecroft is also analysing the vulnerabilities and opportunities facing adolescent girls worldwide. It has conducted extensive research into child labour on the Girls Discovered website, which it produces in collaboration with the Nike Foundation and the United Nations Foundation. Girls Discovered features over 100 indices and interactive maps including global data sets on child labour by sector, chore burden, education and youth poverty. Companies, NGOs, governments and activists can use this freely available resource to identify the countries where adolescent girls are most vulnerable so as to target initiatives and funding to counter child labour and female exploitation.

The issue of child labour is also highlighted by Maplecroft in its labour standards reports which are available for all countries. The reports offer in-depth analysis of child and youth labour, as well as forced labour and trafficking. Examples are available to trial users of the Global Risks Portfolio.

Register to apply for trial access or for more information on any of these resources contact info@maplecroft.com or call +44 (0)1225 420000.