Fundamental principles and rights at work in the cotton, textile and garment value chains

This session will present good practices on the promotion of fundamental principles and rights at work (elimination of child labour, forced labour, and discrimination, right to freedom of association and collective bargaining, and occupational safety and health) in the lower tiers of cotton production in selected countries from Africa, Asia and Latin America. Based on the experience of the CLEAR Cotton project, co-funded by the European Commission and the ILO, and implemented by the ILO in collaboration with FAO, examples will be shared to illustrate ways to empower communities and stakeholders to mitigate vulnerabilities and ensure a value chain free of child and forced labour, in Burkina Faso, Mali and Pakistan. Examples may include: • the piloting of a due diligence strategy in the ginning and spinning sectors of Pakistan – developed on the basis of the OECD Due Diligence Guidance for Responsible Supply Chains, the ILO-IOE Child labour Guidance tool for business, and the UN Guiding Principles Reporting Framework; • the creation of due diligence mechanisms through monitoring bodies – by empowering communities and making local authorities accountable, the risks of child and forced labour are significantly decreased; • the capacity-building and empowerment of cotton producers and their cooperatives in systematically addressing FPRW in their work – cooperatives are critical commercial actors and are ideally placed to bring producers’ voice to national dialogue platform; • providing diversified income generating activities to producers to mitigate their vulnerabilities to shock and prices fluctuation. The session will also address examples of cross-country collaboration in the framework of the Alliance 8.7 between, such as the experience sharing of Brazil labour inspection with Latin American countries, or the public-private partnership in Asia with the Inditex company, or other examples of partnership, such as the FAO Green Climate Fund actions. Registration link coming soon.