The Forum on Corporate Responsibility of Businesses: Prevention of Labour Exploitation will take place at the Ministry of the Interior of the Republic of Latvia in Riga on 6 – 7 June 2019 and will focus on trafficking in human beings in a forced labour perspective. There will be discussed the exploitation of labour workers, and the difference between unsatisfactory working conditions and being a victim of human trafficking by introducing concrete cases from the Nordic and Baltic countries and North-West Russia as well as from the other Member States of the Council of the Baltic Sea States.
The aim of the Forum is to encourage companies and businesses to integrate respect of human rights and corporate responsibility, to develop policies and appropriate processes in the companies in order to fulfil the responsibility for good working conditions according to national laws and international conventions. There will be possibilities to discuss prevention of labour exploitation as an indicator of corporate social responsibility (CSR) and how employers (industry), trade unions and authorities (labour inspection) can be supported to cooperate already during the recruitment processes to guarantee working conditions in line with the legislation.
The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) will contribute to the Forum by organizing a panel on how public procurement practices could be leveraged to combat trafficking in human beings in supply chains. Governments should ensure that goods purchased and services contracted by state institutions are not being made through exploitation of people. The panel will discuss why it is important to use public procurement to prevent human trafficking, existing policies and practices adopted by countries in the OSCE area in this space, efforts by international actors to harmonize policies across different jurisdictions and how governments should cooperate with the private sector to combat human trafficking in supply chains.
National experts (governmental anti-trafficking coordinators, National Rapporteurs, public procurement specialists, judges, prosecutors, police officers, labour inspectors) and businesses from the Nordic countries (Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden), the Baltic States (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania), North-West Russia, Germany and Poland are considered as a target group of the Forum.
For more information, please contact: Ms Lāsma Stabiņa, National Anti-Trafficking Coordinator of the Republic of Latvia, +37167829674, +37129382033; lasma.stabina@iem.gov.lv
Forums are organised by Ministry of the Interior of the Republic of Latvia in cooperation with Nordic Council of Ministers and the Council of the Baltic Sea States (CBSS).
