Business Support For Ethical Trading And Human Rights
The support of ethical trading by businesses around the world is a much-needed boost to those who work in impoverished regions of the globe
. The precepts of ethical trading are based around the idea that companies should only utilise suppliers who treat their employees fairly and justly. In conjunction with this, ethical trading revolves around the idea that producers in impoverished areas of the world should be given a fairer share of the money made from the goods they produce by the companies that procure them to sell elsewhere.
There have been many well documented cases of farmers in Africa being paid very little for their produce, with companies turning these goods around and selling them at a 500% increase in price in places like the UK and the US. Such practices are neither fair nor ethical ways of working and they only serve to widen the poverty gap between the richest and the poorest nations on earth.
Ethical trading should be propagated and practiced by all businesses that operate on a global scale. Those companies that source their products from diverse areas of the planet have a responsibility to ensure that the goods they sell to customers in their home markets have been produced under the same conditions a customer would expect to find there. It seems somewhat repugnant to know that you are paying for a product that has been assembled or picked by a malnourished, badly paid and poorly treated worker in another part of the world and as such we should support those companies that encourage ethical trading and are actively trying to improve the working and living conditions of those less fortunate than us.
By doing such social work in those communities, companies are illustrating their ability to accept social responsibility and to understand that by not supporting the people who seek to exploit a poor and needy workforce, they are making a change for the good of the world and the human race.
Ultimately, ethical trading means that everybody involved in getting a product from its place of origin to where it will be sold gets a fairer slice of the pie. The employees are supported through better working conditions and receive more pay, while the consumers can be safe in the knowledge that the produce they buy from their local stores has been ethically procured. Retailers that support this sort of policy are in turn showing social responsibility and enabling customers to help support those who need it most.