|
|
Following the successful promotion of an alternative to regular commercial trade – backed up by popular trade justice campaigns – mainstream retailers have responded by re-examining their own supply sources.
|
Retailers have paid much more attention to trying to check that working conditions in their supplier factories and workshops cannot be severely criticized.
|
|
Orders from most reputable retailers now require their suppliers to conform to at least some of the minimum international standards of employment that are set out in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
These require minimum rates of pay that at least provide sufficient for basic human needs; no factory employment of school age children; rights to breaks; and so forth.
Although such protocols exist, it is often difficult to be sure that they are fully complied with by all suppliers to importers and retailers.
|
|
|
Attention to these minimum standards is supported by what is branded as the «fair trade» movement, encouraged by various NGOs.
Their «Fairtrade» mark is so heavily advertised that it is familiar to most shoppers.
|
|
.gif){kind=small}
.gif){kind=small}
.gif){kind=small}
For community cooperation internationally
