The Institute co-organises a workshop on protecting human rights in public procurement

The Danish Institute for Human Rights (the Institute), in partnership with Electronics Watch and the University of Greenwich's Business, Human Rights and the Environment Research Group (BHRE), recently held a workshop in Copenhagen to explore ways to strengthen access to remedy for human rights abuses in public procurement. The event brought together 18 procurement and sustainability professionals from local, regional, national, and international bodies to share experiences, challenges, and lessons learned.

During the workshop, the participants shared insights on the role of public buyers in ensuring access to remedy and remediation. They highlighted the variety of ways to engage with remedy within their own internal processes and procedures and in working with their suppliers so that they too provide access to remedy. The workshop also included the presentation of a proposed framework on worker-driven processes of remediation for human rights abuses.

In addition, the participants identified a range of key issues that affect the provision of effective remedy for human rights violations in global value chains linked to public procurement. These include ensuring political support and an enabling policy and regulatory environment, transparency and access to information, bridging the distance to rightsholders in global value chains, increasing leverage and measuring impact

The organisers committed to developing principles for worker-driven remedy and continuing to share information. They also welcomed the opportunity to prepare a follow-up event in 2023 to take stock of the discussion and plan further actions on ensuring remedy in public value chains.

The workshop was held at the Institute’s office in Copenhagen in October 2022. A full summary of the workshop is available here.