Anti-Slavery in the Supply Chain
What is modern slavery?
Modern slavery is the exploitation of individuals for personal or commercial gain. The most common form of this is through human trafficking.
This can see the use of violence, threats or coercion to transport, recruit or harbour people in order to exploit them for purposes such as forced prostitution, labour, criminality, marriage or organ removal.
Modern slavery is all around us, but often just out of sight. People can become entrapped making our clothes, serving our food, picking our crops, working in factories, or working in houses as cooks, cleaners or nannies.
What forms of modern slavery are there?
Modern slavery is not simply paying people less than minimum wage or allowing them to have poor working conditions. It can come in many different forms:
- Forced labour – people forced to do work or services against their will, often with the threat of punishment
- Debt bondage/bonded labour – the world’s most widespread form of slavery whereby people are trapped in poverty, borrow money and are forced to work to pay off their debt, losing control over their debt and employment conditions
- Descent-based slavery – the most traditional form of slavery where individuals are treated as property and their ‘slave’ status passed down the maternal line
- Slavery of children – when a child is exploited for someone else’s gain
- Human trafficking – the use of violence and threats to transport, recruit or harbour people to exploit them for purposes, including labour and criminality
Modern slavery statistics
- Approximately 25 million people are thought to be trapped in forced labour Of which, 16 million are exploited in the private sector, linked to the supply chains of the international businesses supplying our goods and services
- Almost 20% of the world’s global cotton production is linked to China’s forced labour, meaning almost every high street garment company could be implicated
- One in four of those in slavery are children
- 71% are women and girls
Why does slavery still exist?
In some regions ongoing conflict and political instability are key drivers of modern slavery. Global transformations, such as climate change and migration, also increase the vulnerability of many people and therefore the opportunity to exploit them.
In the UK, the Modern Slavery Act obliged big businesses to report on the steps they take to tackle modern slavery in their supply chains.
However, the Act appears to lack teeth and it’s reported around 40% have been found to not comply with the Act.
How is modern slavery connected to a supply chain?
Modern slavery exists in all stages of the supply chain, from the picking of raw materials to manufacturing processes and the latter stages of transport and delivery.
Products will most likely pass through a very long chain of producers, manufacturers and distributors before reaching their intended consumers. The longer and more complex supply chains can make it extremely difficult to track a product’s origins to see who is working where and in what conditions.
The UK is sadly home to incidents of modern slavery, and cases are likely to continue rising.
It’s therefore imperative that companies invest in technology to ensure they have complete visibility of their supply chain and can manage the risks identified with modern slavery.
What can a business do about modern slavery?
Visibility of a business’ supply chain is vital in recognising and dealing with modern slavery.
Having an anti-slavery stance is a positive step forward, but companies also need to ensure their supply chain is following that stance, to avoid implications of modern slavery.
Any connection to modern slavery, either directly or through the supply chain will most likely lead to customer contracts coming under review or simply being cancelled, so having the systems and processes in place to identify and mitigate this is imperative.
This all highlights the importance of supply chain visibility and how technology is the biggest ally to achieve this and avoid potential concerns around modern slavery and other areas, including bribery, ethics and people and communities.
Calathea’s platform enables businesses to clearly define their supply chains, identifying and managing risks including modern slavery.
Advice
Anti-Slavery International and the UK Government have some good advice on modern slavery.
