• Labour standards
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Labour standards

Forced labour and human trafficking are important issues for employers and their organisations, including not only small enterprises on the margins of the formal economy, but also large multinational enterprises with complex supply chains. This handbook seeks to meet the needs of employers’ organisations and individual companies worldwide for guidance on addressing forced labour and human trafficking.

In a series of seven booklets, the handbook provides practical tools and material for business actors of all kinds, identifying what is and is not forced labour, why it is a significant concern for business, and the actions that can be taken to address it.

It also reviews good practice in combating forced labour, provides guidance on preventive and remedial action, and presents information relevant to senior business managers, human resource personnel, sourcing and social compliance staff, social auditors and others. The issues covered in the booklets are:

• Booklet 1: Presents information about relevant international standards, recent figures and data, and forms of forced labour in the global economy alongside excerpts of international Conventions and Protocols
• Booklet 2: A quick reference guide for managers, human resource personnel and others that answers FAQs from employers. The guide addresses topics such as prison labour, forced overtime and debt bondage in an easy-to-use format
• Booklet 3: A set of principles based on International Labour Organisation (ILO) standards and jurisprudence to guide business action against forced labour and trafficking
• Booklet 4: A checklist designed for social auditors and other practitioners for use in enterprise-level assessments. The tool includes questions as well as policy guidance and technical advice on how to conduct assessments
• Booklet 5: Presents some of the key measures that companies and employers' organisations can take to address forced labour at enterprise, national and industry levels, and in global supply chains
• Booklet 6: A set of practical reference guides that identify some of the concrete measures and benefits that companies can take to address forced labour
• Booklet 7: Selected examples of company and industry action that indicate the variety of approaches business actors can take in addressing forced labour at the workplace and in supply chains

The handbook says that employers’ organisations, in particular, are strategically well-placed to provide institutional engagement and sustainability for programmes that address this abuse; and that business involvement is a key to the success of the ILO’s campaign to eradicate forced labour by 2015.

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