Two companies that have worked extensively with Verité to detect and prevent forced labor and human trafficking in their supply chains, NXP Semiconductors and Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE), have won the inaugural Thomson Reuters Foundation Stop Slavery Award.
The initiative recognizes companies that have taken concrete steps to eradicate forced labor from their supply chains. The aim is to create a virtuous cycle, a positive paradigm to demonstrate that business can play a critical role in putting an end to modern-day slavery worldwide.
Both NXP and HPE require their suppliers to pay the fees and expenses associated with the recruitment, selection, and deployment of foreign migrant workers in their supply chain and prohibit the charging or transfer of those costs to the workers themselves – a critical step every company should take to mitigate the risk of having trafficked workers, forced labor, or modern slavery in their supply chains.
“The bar has now been raised for businesses all over the world to follow suit,” said Monique Villa, chief executive of the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
The winners were chosen from a shortlist of 10 companies employing thousands of people in sectors ranging from electronics to retail to mining, and included other Verité clients.
Winners received an Anish Kapoor sculpture – Kapoor delivered a keynote speech at Trust Women in 2014 on the important role art must play in raising public awareness of modern-day slavery – and the right to use the Stop Slavery Award logo for one year. The display of the logo will help guide consumer decisions and will contribute to raising cross-sector awareness on the issue of forced labor, encouraging more companies to take similar action in addressing unfair and illegal practices in their own supply chains.
We congratulate NXP and HPE on their deserved award, and welcome the fact that the Thomson Reuters Foundation recognizes the efforts of those multinational companies that that are forthrightly tackling the risks of forced labor that exist in every global supply chain, and in every sector, that employs migrant workers.