Climate justice and wage justice go hand in hand in global supply chains

At the 12th OECD forum on responsible business conduct in Paris, discussions on the second day turned to the escalating impact of climate change on workers. The message from trade unions was clear: climate resilience and workers’ rights cannot be separated.

Research presented during the session showed rising medical visits and absenteeism during periods of extreme heat. Workers often absorb the burden through income loss, increased production pressure and unsafe conditions.

Factory representatives outlined adaptation measures such as improved ventilation, hydration systems, adjusted shifts, emergency planning and infrastructure upgrades. Yet many acknowledged that suppliers cannot shoulder these investments alone. Without changes in purchasing practices and shared financial responsibility, adaptation costs risk being pushed down the supply chain once again onto workers.

Trade union and informal worker representatives stressed that climate adaptation must include worker voice, social protection and income security, particularly for women workers and those in the informal economy who face severe financial shocks when temperatures rise. Due diligence must go beyond policies and audits to include real-time monitoring, enforceable health and safety standards and purchasing practices that allow flexibility when conditions become dangerous.

IndustriALL general secretary, Atle Høie, reinforced that climate resilience is inseparable from trade union rights, warning that solutions will fail if workers are excluded.

“We have to be very honest: we are very short on protection today. The production of our clothes happens in countries where heat is becoming a serious health issue and where trade unions hardly have a place. If you fight the existence of trade unions, you will never find solutions to these problems because the people experiencing them every day must be at the table. Trade union rights are a fundamental human right.”

He added that workers cannot be expected to shoulder the costs of adaptation. Brands, factory owners and ultimately consumers must share responsibility and scalable models such as the International Accord system are being developed to ensure shared costs and stronger health and safety protections, including addressing heat stress as a core workplace issue.

Binding agreements deliver: Unions push wages and accountability in global supply chains

At the 12th OECD Forum on responsible business conduct in Paris, marking 50 years of the OECD guidelines for multinational enterprises, IndustriALL delivered a clear message: resilience must be built on binding agreements, responsible purchasing practices and collective bargaining, not voluntary pledges.

In the opening panel on supply chain shocks, IndustriALL garment and textile director Christina Hajagos-Clausen challenged the structural imbalance in global production, warning that supply chain “agility” frequently shifts commercial risk downward.

“When crises hit, brands adjust their purchasing practices overnight. Workers do not have that flexibility. Without collective bargaining and binding agreements, they are left to absorb the shock.”

OECD data presented at the forum showed that while most companies now publish sustainability information, only a small proportion meaningfully report on human rights due diligence. For unions, this reflects a persistent implementation transparency gap which without enforceability does not protect workers.

Christina Hajagos-Clausen stressed that collaboration only works when it includes enforceable commitments on purchasing practices, wages and industrial relations. Binding models such as the Bangladesh Accord and the ACT Cambodia framework demonstrate how negotiated agreements can embed worker representation into supply chain governance and create greater predictability in times of crisis.

An ACT-organized session focused on Cambodia’s brand-supported collective bargaining agreements, a practical effort to connect purchasing commitments with higher wages.

Athit Kong, president of Cambodian union CCADWU, emphasized the importance of bringing brands directly into bargaining structures:

“This is the element of bringing the brand in. I don’t see another model than these three coming together that would be more beneficial to workers. We want to make decent wages, but we also want to make this sustainable for the industry, the skills foundation is necessary.”

His intervention highlighted that wage increases must rest on strong industrial relations systems that deliver fairness for workers and stability for the sector.
Speakers acknowledged that many corporate initiatives have failed to deliver real improvements. The emerging consensus was clear: wage growth cannot be separated from purchasing commitments. Responsible purchasing must reinforce, not undermine, collective bargaining.

Cambodia’s garment sector, employing predominantly women and supporting millions of livelihoods, has become a testing ground for this approach. While described as a “leap of faith,” binding agreements on purchasing are beginning to show measurable results, built on trust between brands, unions and employers and aligned with national industrial priorities and skills development.

IndustriALL general secretary, Atle Høie, underscored the impact:

“It is crucial to connect collective bargaining with brands’ purchasing practices to implement a living wage. In Cambodia, this is becoming a reality. We now have eight signed collective agreements lifting the wages of tens of thousands of workers. This is a sensational agreement and it shows that binding commitments can deliver real results for workers.”

The conclusion from Paris was unmistakable: resilience without workers’ rights is an illusion. Enforceable standards, sectoral bargaining and shared responsibility are the foundation of stable and just supply chains.

For IndustriALL, the direction is clear: move from voluntary commitments to binding agreements, align purchasing with wage-setting and ensure workers and their unions are embedded in supply chain governance.
Binding agreements deliver and when unions are at the table, supply chains become more stable, predictable and fair.

Wages and social security: Key demands of Indonesian affiliates

The ruling said that employment provisions should be removed from the Job Creation law and asked for a new labour law, giving lawmakers up to two years to prepare it, with a deadline of 31 October 2026 to enact a new labour law in line with Constitutional Court requirements. Since November 2024, the Indonesian Parliament has included discussion of a new labour law on its list of national legislative priorities, signalling political recognition of the need to revise the current framework following the Omnibus Law and related Constitutional Court rulings.

As a follow-up to the 2025 affiliates meeting on Labour Law Reform, Indonesian affiliates call for the development and adoption of a new labour law that fully complies with international labour standards. The proposed law should provide comprehensive protection for workers, including improvements in wage policies, expansion and strengthening of social security coverage, enhanced occupational safety and health (OSH) protections and stronger safeguards for fundamental workers’ rights, including freedom of association and collective bargaining.

Indonesian affiliates demand the realization of decent wages, rather than merely minimum wages. This includes establishing a more robust and transparent wage-setting mechanism by strengthening the role and functions of Wage Councils at national, provincial,and sectoral levels. Affiliates also call for the full implementation of wage scales and structures at the company level to ensure fair wage progression, transparency and equal pay for work of equal value.

On social security, Indonesian affiliates call for expanded, more inclusive employment-based social security coverage. This includes stronger enforcement measures to ensure that employers register all workers in the national social security system. Affiliates also demand the development of social security protection schemes for workers affected by the energy transition and climate change, recognizing the growing risks of job displacement and livelihood loss. In addition, there is a call to strengthen maternity protection through improved maternity benefit schemes, including longer maternity leave. Indonesian affiliates further urge the government to ratify ILO Convention No. 102 on Social Security (Minimum Standards) as a key step toward strengthening the national social protection framework in line with international labour standards.

Kemal Özkan, assistant general secretary of IndustriALL Global Union said that it’s time for Indonesian affiliates to take concrete action on the proposed labour law reform. Wages and social security are the key demands in the fight for equality and workers’ rights.

Ramon Certeza, the regional secretary of IndustriALL SEAO, said that IndustriALL affiliates in Indonesia should strengthen their unity and unite around a common demand for the new labour law proposal.

Iwan Kusmawan, chair of the Indonesia Council, was very optimistic about the establishment of the task force and hoped that the IndustriALL affiliates would develop a collective demand for the proposed new labour law. Iwan said:

“We will work with the task force on wages and social security by March and work together with experts and other stakeholders on our proposed new labour law.”

India: 300 million workers mobilize

According to preliminary union assessments, over 300 million workers, farmers and other sections of the people took part in strike actions and mass mobilisations across more than 600 districts. From coal mines to public offices, workers across formal and informal sectors stopped work in solidarity. Markets closed in many regions, public transport was at a standstill and industrial areas witnessed large union-led processions. Notably, women workers from various unorganized sectors were seen at the forefront, while students and youth joined protests demanding jobs and public education.

This massive action is the latest escalation in a long-running struggle against the four labour codes, pushed through Parliament without consultation, without convening the Indian Labour Conference and in open disregard of international labour standards. Trade unions have now organized six nationwide general strikes since the codes were introduced, because of the government repeatedly ignoring workers’ demands. Unions warn that the codes weaken collective bargaining, restrict the right to strike, push nearly 70 per cent of factories outside labour law coverage, and strip millions of workers of occupational safety, social security, and wage protections.

Frustrations with the legal developments have further intensified since the release of the Draft Labour Policy Shram Shakti Niti 2025, which unions say openly seeks to centralize power, and recast the state as a facilitator for employers rather than a guarantor of workers’ rights.

Affiliated unions of IndustriALL played an active role in the mobilization, with workers from manufacturing, mining, energy, textiles and related sectors joining the nationwide action. Although each union brought forward sector-specific concerns, there was clear convergence around demands for job security, fair wages, social protection and in defence of collective bargaining rights.

Sanjay Vadhavkar, general secretary of Steel, Metal & Engineering Workers’ Federation of India and IndustriALL executive committee member said:

“The government cannot continue to ignore the collective voice of the working population. We are demanding dignity, job security and the recognition of health, safety and social protection as fundamental rights. Any development model that sidelines workers’ welfare is neither sustainable nor just. We will continue to struggle until our demands are met, including the immediate withdrawal of anti-worker labour reforms and the establishment of meaningful dialogue with trade unions and workers.”

Sanjay Singh, general secretary of Indian National Electricity Workers Federation and IndustriALL executive committee member stated:

“The message from workers is clear: stop dismantling labour protections. Job security, safe workplaces and social protection are workers’ rights, not concessions to be granted at the government’s convenience. We will continue to fight for the repeal of the four Labour Codes, the restoration of MGNREGA, the revival of the Old Pension Scheme and the full implementation of our genuine demands.”

Kemal Özkan, Secrétaire général adjoint d’IndustriALL, a déclaré :

« La force de cette grève réside dans l’unité et la détermination de la classe ouvrière indienne. IndustriALL est pleinement solidaire des syndicats et des travailleurs indiens. Leurs revendications reflètent les normes internationales fondamentales du travail, notamment la liberté syndicale, la négociation collective, la protection sociale et la sécurité des conditions de travail, autant de droits qui doivent être respectés et défendus par le gouvernement. »

Empowering African trade unions, enforcing rights with human rights due diligence

In Sub-Saharan Africa, the imperative for HRDD is especially acute given the region’s outsized role in supplying minerals critical to the energy transition, electronics and renewable energy industries. The continent holds major reserves of cobalt, copper, lithium, manganese and nickel whose demand has surged amid decarbonisation efforts worldwide. Yet extraction remains beset by entrenched human-rights risks: forced community displacements, violations of workers and human rights, environmental degradation, adverse health effects on local populations and in some instances, ties to conflict financing or organized crime.

HRDD draws its foundation from the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs), endorsed in 2011, which impose on companies a responsibility to respect human rights via ongoing processes of identification, prevention, mitigation and remediation of adverse impacts. Sector-specific guidance, notably the OECD’s Due Diligence Guidance for Responsible Supply Chains of Minerals from Conflict-Affected and High-Risk Areas, has proved influential for tin, tantalum, tungsten and gold in conflict zones such as Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

The mining landscape in Sub-Saharan Africa presents a mixed picture. Large-scale operations often controlled by multinationals from China, Europe, Canada and elsewhere face persistent criticism over inadequate community consultation, water and soil pollution, hazardous working conditions, poverty-level wages, gender-based violence and harassment, and suppression of union activity, including breaches of freedom of association and collective bargaining. Artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM), prevalent in countries such as the DRC, Ghana, Tanzania and Zimbabwe, worsens these vulnerabilities with child labour, toxic mercury exposure and exploitation by criminal networks.

Data from the Business and Human Rights Resource Centre’s Transition Minerals Tracker underscore the scale of the problem. For example, between 2010 and 2024, it recorded 178 human-rights and environmental abuses linked to transition minerals in Africa which is more than 20 per cent of the global total of 835 cases. The DRC alone accounted for over half of Africa’s allegations, mostly at cobalt and copper sites.

Unions, including IndustriALL Global Union affiliates in the DRC, Zambia and Zimbabwe, are pressing hard for rigorous HRDD implementation. Their advocacy emphasises scrutiny of corporate disclosures, risk mapping and the adoption of national action plans on business and human rights still absent in most African countries. They call for binding rules to secure fair-trade terms, greater local beneficiation, living wages and environmental stewardship.

Recent regulatory shifts are reshaping HRDD. The European Union’s Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD), now in force, mandates HRDD for large companies operating in or exporting to the EU, including human-rights and environmental impacts throughout value chains. This compels mining firms and their Sub-Saharan suppliers to strengthen processes, undertake audits and offer remediation or face exclusion from the European market. Complementary EU measures on batteries, deforestation and conflict minerals add further layers of scrutiny to African-sourced minerals.

However, challenges remain formidable: weak governance, corruption, limited enforcement capacity and opaque supply chains all impede effective due diligence. In high-risk settings such as conflict zones or informal gold sectors in Zimbabwe, HRDD frequently falls short of eradicating harms.

At the roundtable, Kelly Fay Rodriguez of the CCHRDD announced the launch of a dedicated project in the DRC, Zambia and Zimbabwe to support mine workers in critical minerals value chains. The initiative aims to ensure that emerging international due-diligence laws and trade policies deliver gains for labour rights, with particular focus on freedom of association and collective bargaining.

Established in 2025 by UNI Global Union, IndustriALL Global Union, the Friedrich Ebert Foundation and Germany’s DGB trade-union confederation, the CCHRDD exists to harness HRDD frameworks in ways that reinforce workers’ rights especially the enabling rights of union organization and bargaining across global value chains.

The meeting closed on a note of cautious optimism: HRDD offers mining companies a tool for risk mitigation while presenting unions and host societies with leverage for more inclusive development.

As Glen Mpufane, IndustriALL’s mining director, put it:

“Effective implementation of HRDD supported by stronger national frameworks, active union engagement, and international accountability is essential if mineral wealth is to translate into genuine economic progress rather than perpetuating patterns of extraction without equitable returns.”

Beyond the mining deals

This year, 9 to 12 February, the two events ran in parallel at separate venues in the city. The mainstream Indaba, investor-focused and corporate-oriented, drew the usual crowd of executives pursuing partnerships and capital flows in critical minerals. By contrast, the Alternative Mining Indaba, under the theme Alternative Stories of Mining, amplified the perspectives of marginalised and Indigenous communities, trade unions, and civil-society groups insistent on mining practices that reduce poverty, narrow inequality, and foster sustainable livelihoods rather than merely extract value.

The persistent contrast of wealth generated by mines put next to persistent poverty in host communities featured prominently in discussions, as did the risk of creating so-called green sacrifice zones where the costs of the global energy transition fall disproportionately on vulnerable populations in mineral-rich regions.

Trade unions, including affiliates of IndustriALL Global Union from Australia, Namibia, South Africa and Zimbabwe, engaged actively at both forums. They pressed mining companies on workers’ rights, decent working standards, sustainable extraction, and the need for a Just Transition. During a meeting on 11 February, emphasis fell on the Initiative for Responsible Mining Assurance (IRMA) as one of the more credible mechanisms for safeguarding labour rights, community interests, and environmental protections. At the Alternative Mining Indaba, unions stressed that workers form an integral part of affected communities and are therefore equally exposed to environmental, social, and governance failures.

Critical transition minerals including cobalt, lithium, graphite, and others essential to batteries and renewable energy dominated agendas at both gatherings. Sessions explored how to harness these resources for broader economic benefit, the resurgence of resource nationalism, the scope for equitable global supply-chain partnerships, human-capital development, geopolitical dynamics, regulatory frameworks, and the role of governments. Chinese multinational corporations came under scrutiny for their close ties to host governments and workers’ rights violations in countries such as Zambia and Zimbabwe.

In a panel on corporate accountability at the AMI, IndustriALL outlined its strategy of engaging major players including Anglo American, Glencore and Rio Tinto through global company networks, structured dialogue, and collective bargaining. IndustriALL affiliates are also forging alliances with artisanal and small-scale mining associations and local communities in the DRC, Zambia and Zimbabwe, with initial cooperation centred on health and safety improvements.

As Glen Mpufane, IndustriALL director for mining observed:

“The dialogue and engagement at both the Mining Indaba and the Alternative Mining Indaba is taking place in contested spaces. However, trade unions should continue to exploit these platforms to advance the Just Transition and defend workers’ interests, particularly as global demand for transition minerals intensifies.”

IndustriALL and Electronics Watch strengthen partnership on workers’ rights

IndustriALL Global Union and Electronics Watch have signed a new memorandum of understanding (MoU) to deepen their collaboration in protecting and promoting workers’ rights across global electronics and low-emission vehicle supply chains.

The agreement brings together IndustriALL’s global trade union network and Electronics Watch’s industry-independent monitoring system, which supports over 1,500 public buyers in Europe and Australia. By combining organizing power with worker-driven monitoring and public procurement leverage, the partners aim to deliver concrete improvements for workers in complex, globalized supply chains.

Under the MoU, the two organizations commit to promoting freedom of association and the right to collective bargaining, addressing labour rights violations, particularly those affecting vulnerable workers, and advancing effective human rights due diligence. The collaboration will focus on facilities across the electronics supply chain, including mines, smelters, refineries and manufacturing sites, especially where workers are organized or seeking to organize with IndustriALL affiliates.

A central pillar of the partnership is worker-driven monitoring and remediation. Electronics Watch will share relevant monitoring findings, subject to confidentiality. While IndustriALL and its affiliates will provide evidence from workplaces where union busting, anti-union discrimination or bad-faith bargaining is taking place. Together, the organizations will coordinate action to ensure remediation of violations, trade union recognition through free and fair processes and meaningful collective bargaining that improves wages, working conditions and job security.

The MoU also establishes clear mechanisms for coordination, governance and communication. Joint initiatives will be guided by agreed decision-making structures, regular meetings and shared monitoring and evaluation frameworks to assess progress and impact. Where appropriate, joint steering committees will be set up for specific projects, ensuring transparency and accountability.

By formalizing this collaboration, IndustriALL and Electronics Watch aim to drive long-term, structural improvements in the electronics industry, centering workers’ voices, strengthening solidarity and ensuring that public procurement contributes to respect for labour rights throughout global supply chains.

IndustriALL general secretary, Atle Høie, said: “The new agreement will strengthen worker-driven approaches in global supply chains. Effective human rights due diligence must be rooted in freedom of association, strong trade unions, and collective bargaining that delivers real improvements for workers.”

No Just Transition without workers’ power

Launched during a virtual side session to the Garment Forum, the manifesto sets out why a Just Transition is urgent, and why unions must shape it.

More than 400 million people work in the sector worldwide, most of them women in the Global South facing low wages, unsafe conditions, heat stress, job insecurity and weak social protection. As decarbonization, automation and digitalization accelerate, workers risk being pushed further to the margins.

A transition without safeguards deepens inequality

Garment workers are already living the impacts of climate change. Extreme heat, floods, factory shutdowns and wage losses are daily realities, particularly for women, informal and migrant workers. Yet those most affected are rarely consulted.

Unions warned that climate action without worker protection deepens injustice. Green policies and new production models are transforming supply chains, but without regulation and planning they are driving job losses, intensifying work and widening inequality.

Decisions made without workers

Climate and sustainability strategies are largely shaped by governments and brands, while workers bear the consequences of restructuring and automation.

The manifesto demands worker-led decision-making through unions and social dialogue. Governments must actively promote social dialogue. Employers and brands must engage responsibly. Unions must assess climate risks and negotiate solutions that work for workers.

Speakers also pointed to the imbalance of power in global supply chains. Brands set prices and deadlines while shifting costs and risks onto suppliers and workers. Voluntary commitments are not enough.

Binding rules, not voluntary promises

The manifesto calls for binding obligations, responsible purchasing and real corporate accountability. Workers’ rights, living wages, health and safety and gender equity must be central.

The sector faces serious environmental challenges, from water use to chemical pollution, often borne in the Global South. There are opportunities in renewable energy and new production models, but only if governed in workers’ interests and secured through collective bargaining.

More than a statement, the manifesto is a tool for negotiation and organizing. It calls for binding responsibility from brands and governments and systemic change that centres workers in climate and digital policies.

The message from unions was clear: a Just Transition is not optional — it is urgent.

“Jobs are being displaced, work is intensifying, surveillance is expanding, skills gaps are widening and informal labour is growing. Without action, we will see rising job losses, deepening poverty and an escalation of gender-based violence.

“A Just Transition must ensure that climate solutions create decent work, not new forms of exploitation. That’s why the manifesto sets out a clear path for worker-led change, binding responsibility for brands and governments and protections that guarantee rights, dignity and collective bargaining for the people who make our clothes,”

says IndustriALL textile and garment director Christina Hajagos-Clausen.

Digel workers escalate struggle after continued refusal to recognize union

Digel workers have faced systematic anti-union practices after organizing with Turkish textile union TEKSİF, including dismissals and prolonged legal delays aimed at weakening workers’ resolve. From the beginning, the company has insisted on not recognizing the union.

Importantly, TEKSİF has won a lawsuit at the local court confirming that the union had secured the legally required majority to become the bargaining partner, contrary to the company’s claims. Despite this clear court ruling, Digel management has continued its obstruction by pursuing further legal action.

Throughout the resistance, TEKSİF has carried out sustained initiatives to support the workers and had begun planning a series of international solidarity actions to strengthen pressure on the company.

However, just as these plans were about to be implemented, TEKSİF general president Nazmi Irgat, together with the union’s legal counsel, held a series of meetings with Digel Textile management. During these meetings, management indicated that it would not file an appeal and declared that it was open to social dialogue.

Despite this indication, Digel management reversed its position only one week later, filing an appeal in what the union describes as a deliberate tactic to maliciously delay the legal process and prolong the workers’ suffering.

This development has deepened anger and frustration among Digel workers and TEKSİF members, making it necessary to escalate the struggle to the international level. In response, preparations are now underway for union representatives and resisting Digel workers to travel to Germany, where they plan to organize protests and public actions in front of Digel’s headquarters.

“Our aim is to realize this protest visit as quickly as possible and to significantly increase pressure on Digel management so that the workers’ legitimate demands are met,”

the union said.

In this critical phase of the struggle, TEKSİF has underlined that the solidarity, coordination and active support of IndustriALL Global Union are of vital importance. By taking the fight beyond national borders, the union and workers are sending a clear message that union-busting and bad-faith legal manoeuvres will not go unanswered.

IndustriALL assistant general secretary, Kemal Özkan, said:

“Digel’s continued refusal to recognize the union, despite a court ruling confirming TEKSİF’s legal majority, exposes a clear lack of respect for workers’ trade union rights. These deliberate delays are an attack on workers’ right to collective bargaining and they will not go unanswered. IndustriALL stands firmly with Digel workers and TEKSİF and will support the escalation of this struggle internationally.”

UAW-Volkswagen deal marks historic breakthrough

The tentative agreement, which will now be put to a ratification vote by the workforce, includes a 20 per cent wage increase, enhanced healthcare benefits, stronger job security provisions and improved paid time off. It is the first union contract at the Volkswagen Chattanooga plant, which was until the vote in 2024 the last VW operation anywhere in the world without a union.

The historic organizing effort in Chattanooga was itself a breakthrough for labour in the traditionally difficult landscape of the American South after earlier union drives in 2014 and 2019 had failed to secure worker support. The union win in 2024 came after a complex and prolonged battle with company management, which failed to show the required neutrality for a very long time.

IndustriALL Global Union general secretary Atle Høie says:

“I am in awe of the UAW’s relentlessness in fighting for what is right and standing up for workers’ rights in a climate that systematically seeks to weaken organized labour.

“This victory is not just a win for the workers at Volkswagen but hope for millions of workers across the US, proving that persistence and solidarity can pave the way for significant improvement in workers’ rights and justice on the job.”

For the UAW, the tentative contract represents both a material gain for Volkswagen employees and a symbolic milestone in efforts to expand union influence beyond the Big Three Detroit automakers. The Southern auto industry has long been hostile territory for organized labour, making the Chattanooga success a potential catalyst for further campaigns in the region and across the US manufacturing sector.

The 3,200 workers at the Chattanooga plant will now review the terms of the tentative agreement ahead of a formal ratification vote in the coming weeks.