"It is not acceptable in the 21st century world to tolerate supply chains that abuse labour and human rights"
By Kylie MacLellan and Liisa Tuhkanen
LONDON, Nov 19 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Shareholders and governments must play a greater role in stamping out the use of slavery in company supply chains, a senior vice president of U.S.-based asset manager Calvert Investments said on Wednesday.
Almost 36 million people are living as slaves around the world, more than 14 million of them in India, according to estimates published by Australia-based human rights group The Walk Free Foundation on Monday.
The International Labour Organisation estimates almost 21 million people globally are victims of forced labour.
"Shareholders have to bang the drum ... that it is just not acceptable in the 21st century world to tolerate supply chains that abuse labour and human rights," said Bennett Freeman, head of sustainability research and policy at Calvert, which manages more than $13.5 billion in assets.
"We have the power to make it economically unacceptable through the allocation of our investments," he told the Trust Women conference in London, organised by the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
Freeman said Calvert supported the British government's planned laws to tackle modern slavery, and called on the U.S. government to enact anti-trafficking legislation.
"We cannot and must not, in my view, rely mostly, let alone solely, on corporate responsibility. We have to depend as well on government responsibility, on public policy, on law, on legislation, on regulation," he said.
Louise Nicholls, head of responsible sourcing at retailer Marks & Spencer, said there was an increasing reliance among food industry suppliers globally on temporary and migrant labour which risked the involvement of trafficking.
"Often that means that in travelling for the promise of work they are relying on middlemen and we are seeing an increasing number of unscrupulous middlemen ... individuals arriving for a job which is not what they were promised," she said.
Nicholls said companies also needed to do more to make sure that audits of their supply chains were "fit for the job", including making on-the-ground visits and working more closely with third-party recruiters of labour. (Editing by Guy Faulconbridge)
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
