Verité is active on many fronts to bring our labor rights experts together with those protecting the natural environment. We believe strongly that supply chain “sustainability” is best pursued holistically with the needs of people, communities, and ecosystems considered and approached in complementary ways. One significant effort has been our participation in the Accountability Framework Initiative (AFi).
As part of Verité’s ongoing work to improve labor practices in the Latin American coffee sector under the U.S. Department of Labor-funded Cooperation on Fair, Free, Equitable Employment (COFFEE) Project, this year we are launching pilot projects in three key coffee producing countries — Brazil, Colombia, and Mexico.
Verité research has found that the use of labor brokers (including village-level agents, recruiters, labor contractors, and crew leaders) is widespread throughout the Latin American coffee sector, including in Brazil.
Few reports have as much significance in the world of labor rights as the bi-annual U.S. Department of Labor’s List of Goods Produced by Child Labor or Forced Labor, the latest edition of which was released on September 30.