August 11, 2025 Safeguarding Workers’ Rights Amid Global Turmoil

Find out how manufacturers can safeguard workers’ rights in spite of international turmoil.

By Carmel Giblin, CEO and President, Ethical Supply Chain Program

Data from the IUTC’s 2025 Global Rights Index highlights that workers’ rights are collapsing across every continent. Alarmingly, Europe and the Americas recorded their worst scores since the Index’s inception in 2014 – and only seven out of 151 countries surveyed received a top-tier rating.

Political tensions and economic headwinds are undoubtedly making these issues harder to tackle. The ongoing tariff war between China and the US and the conflict in the Middle East are having a major effect on trade – in China, factory activity shrank for the third straight month in June due to weak demand.

Many brands are cutting costs or moving their supplier bases to other territories in a bid to control spending and navigate this disruption. Nike, for instance, recently revealed that it is planning to reduce its reliance on Chinese production to soften the impact of US tariffs.

As more brands focus on cost-cutting measures and improving efficiencies, the people in their supply chain can easily be forgotten. The support and initiatives available to workers in factories are already being affected – and progress in improving labor standards appears to be slowing down.

It’s not all bad news however. Many employers are still dedicated to ensuring that their workers’ rights are respected throughout the company’s supply chain, and it is vital that they are not thrown off course by the current political turbulence. As well as the moral and regulatory reasons for treating workers well, there is also a sound business case.

If employees are happier and more engaged, absenteeism rates and staff turnover drop. Both of these problems are expensive and plague many factories. Customers also still care about how brands treat their employees. Reputation matters and the mistreatment of workers, no matter how far down the supply chain, can have a damaging effect on sales and share prices if it becomes public.

Keeping the lines of communication open

One major challenge for businesses is how to spot that workplace standards for employees are slipping when goods are being sourced from suppliers in many different territories.

Most factories will have some form of audit or assessment in place that examines labor conditions and safety procedures. However, it is important that organizations further up the chain do not simply consider the audit as “job done”. The results need to be taken seriously, with time spent identifying where further investigation may be required and working out a plan for improvement.

This means working closely with your suppliers. No organization likes to receive grand edicts from above, so it’s important that you collaborate with your supplier’s management team to identify the root cause of issues and find ways to correct them, along with setting realistic deadlines. Encouraging a culture of collaboration and communication rather than “I say, you do,” also makes it more likely that they will seek help when something is awry.

This also extends to helping the supplier fully understand their workforce’s needs. Factories need to consider how they can put employee wellbeing at the heart of what they do and develop targeted solutions that improve worker quality of life.

Actions not words

Many initiatives that can make significant differences to the wellbeing of a workforce are relatively straightforward to achieve.

Setting up a worker helpline is one example. This type of confidential grievance mechanism is usually handled by a third-party and enables factory workers to air their concerns or ask questions. These could range from minor concerns about terminology in their employment contract to more serious issues such as the safety of their working environment, sexual harassment claims and examples of child and forced labor.

Another highly effective measure is to offer employer-funded childcare. This support is of immense value in locations such as China, where workers frequently travel long distances to find employment and are often working in factories where they are away from their children for months or years at a time.  Even when families are close by, as in Vietnam and Mexico, supporting workers to access quality childcare is a game-changer for factory workers who are faced with the stark choice of staying in work or leaving work to mind their children.

Childcare initiatives make a particular difference for women, who often shoulder the greater responsibility of childcare. With the right support they can continue to work while ensuring their children are not missing out on learning and development opportunities, and most importantly, are safe.

Where a gender gap exists – whether it be pay or career development opportunities – factories can also establish processes and policies to ensure equality in the workplace. This might take the form of inclusive language in hiring policies or training materials. Or it might mean more practical steps such as enhancing workplace support for those who are pregnant or breastfeeding.

If companies don’t have a permanent physical presence in a supplier’s location, a good approach is to work with a partner on the ground, who can roll out such initiatives as those above. In this way they can discuss progress, make improvements and ensure that appropriate training and support is being provided to factory management.

When business leaders are faced with change on the seismic level we’re currently seeing, it’s easy to see why their focus moves to adaptation and survival. But the answer to these challenges must not be to roll back workers’ rights by a decade or two. We’ve come a long way on the journey to fairer workplaces worldwide, and while it’s not easy to maintain standards when you are dealing with several levels of supply chain distributed round the world, nor is it impossible.

About the Author:
Carmel Giblin is President & CEO of the Ethical Supply Chain Program (ESCP), formerly known as the ICTI Ethical Toy Program.

Carmel strongly believes that businesses in all sectors have a duty to improve labor and environmental standards across their supply chains, by putting transparency at the core of everything they do.

In her role, she is committed to supporting and growing the ESCP’s membership base – while also overseeing the organization’s responsible sourcing programs, which aim to meet the needs of workers, manufacturers, suppliers, licensors, and retailers.

As a committed advocate of better lives for workers she had led the development and successful implementation of a range of worker well-being programs which have led to significant enhancements in worker welfare in global supply chains.

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