Embracing disability as a diversity factor in the 21st century’s world of work

Jürgen Menze

Jürgen Menze,
Disability Inclusion Officer

Including persons with disabilities as employees, customers and business partner is clearly the smart thing to do from a business point of view. Yet, while companies increasingly recognize the benefits of building and retaining diverse workforces, they often neglect disability in their inclusion practices.

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Children belong in school, not in supply chains

Benjamin Smith, Senior Officer for Corporate Social Responsibility

Benjamin Smith, Senior Officer for Corporate Social Responsibility
International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour

The importance of employers in the worldwide movement against child labour has never been clearer. The corporate responsibility to respect human rights, including a child’s right to be free from child labour, is now widely recognized. Today, companies that don’t have a policy against child labour are outside the mainstream.

The challenge is to ensure that policy commitments achieve results — and this requires action on the ground, in workplaces and communities. I was in Blantyre, Malawi recently to train a company’s agronomists on combating child labour in agriculture. Every day, these agronomists — who are mostly young men and women — travel huge distances over rough terrain on Honda 125 motorcycles, visiting farms to advise farmers on when to plant, what fertilizers work best and when to harvest.

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