Confronting Human Trafficking and Forced Labor in Global Supply Chain

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September 15, 2022 - Below are excerpts from Waelter’s article Confronting Human Trafficking and Forced Labor in Global Supply Chain. This article originally ran in Security, a twice-monthly security-focused eNewsletter for security end users, brought to you by Security Magazine.

Much has been made of COVID-19’s impact on global supply chain performance and awareness over the past two years. Over time, this disruption has led organizations to constantly evaluate their supply chain performance in search of greater optimization.

Unfortunately, increased supply chain attention has not yet led to more scrutiny around one of the most disheartening effects of globalization: human trafficking and forced labor. Common examples of trafficking can include trafficking for forced labor, trafficking for forced criminal activities, trafficking of women and children for sexual exploitation, trafficking for the removal of organs, and people smuggling. Forced labor takes many forms, but includes labor that is forced due to indebtedness, which is very common in supply chain branches that rely on migrant labor.

It may seem like these practices could never occur on a well-meaning company’s watch, but that is simply not the reality. As sourcing has gone global and efficiency has become a top priority, companies all over the world have, knowingly or unknowingly, had this practice occurring in their supply chains.

While human trafficking and forced labor often take place in emerging or frontier markets – where, due to price point, the sourcing of products is most prevalent – the trafficking of persons and forced labor can also happen in more developed markets. If business leaders want to prioritize sustainability in their supply chains, they would be wise to consider several strategies to prevent both these issues.

Take a Stance

Before taking any action on human trafficking or forced labor, organizations must first look inward. As a company, do you want to be a leader? Or would you settle for just not being in the headlines? Once company leaders set a direction, sustainability specialists can help with benchmarking against competitors and other relevant companies, as well as local legal requirements in the geographies in which the organization is present. This background research helps develop the essential materials of this stage: codes of conduct for employees and suppliers.

Raise Awareness Through Training

Setting company guidelines around labor abuse is key, but no amount of regulation can help unless the expectations are followed at every level. As such, businesses should develop level-appropriate training that covers what various employees should watch for and guidelines for how to report it.

Get to Know Your Supply Chain

It may feel like the job is done once key stakeholders are informed of company expectations, but this is not the case. To follow best practices around human trafficking and forced labor prevention, companies should pursue more advanced tactics, such as supply chain mapping, desktop and onsite due diligence, and corrective action.

Once a business identifies potential risks in its supply chain, it must follow through with corrective action to prevent future non-compliance. This process often starts with enforcing regular vetting of all third-party agencies, contractors, and suppliers, even those with existing long-term relationships. Businesses can also build more reasonable timelines in their contracts to ensure that partners don’t feel pressured to seek illicit solutions to production capacity challenges.

While it takes many resources to sufficiently address labor abuse, organizations must press on. Not only can their efforts help to mitigate the abuse of those working everywhere, but they can also bring business benefits. At a time when every company is hoping to showcase their efforts in sustainability, addressing human trafficking and forced labor on a meaningful scale should be a strongly emphasized component of these efforts and will allow a company to be a true leader in sustainability.

Read BSI Principal Consultant, Sustainable Supply Chains, Fred Waelter’s full article featured in Security Magazine on confronting human trafficking and forced labor in the global supply chain.

Fred Waelter

Fred Waelter

Fred Waelter is a multilingual and well-travelled supply-chain and human rights professional with more than 15 years of experience in Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and social auditing.  Fred began his career as a full-time Social Auditor in China and has since been promoted six times to a variety of roles based in four countries on three continents. He consults multinational clients on supply-chain monitoring and remediation program development and implementation and serves as his clients’ first choice for information on developments in industry, and monitoring program design and efficacy. Fred is known as a thought leader in the industry, liaising with both clients and major social compliance initiatives to design audit tools and protocols, serving as the voice of the third-party auditor in the field. Fred’s specialties include labor law in China, Japan, UK, and Vietnam, fraud detection in social auditing, social audit protocol design (employee interview sampling methodology, payroll/time record and other documentation review), unauthorized subcontracting investigation, agricultural audits. His experience in working with social compliance initiatives includes amfori(formerly  BSCI), Ethical Trading  Initiative (ETI),  Initiative for Compliance  and  Sustainability (ICS), Global  Social Compliance  Initiative (GSCP),  Responsible  Jewelry Council  (RJC), and  the Seafood Task Force (STF).

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