Factories and producers were shifting manufacturing or sourcing of raw materials to an increasingly complex network of suppliers, but there was no incentive to look into how a supplier produced, for example, raw cotton or shoe soles. During the early days of globalization, it was relatively easy for corporations to either hide, or be ignorant of, human rights and environmental atrocities committed along their supply chain. After the software is download, you will receive a serial number.Luwowo Coltan mine near Rubaya, DR Congo, is one of several validated mining sites that guarantee conflict-free minerals. Knoll Light Factory Plug-In from Red Giant is an electronic download of a lens flare. Download Adobe Illustrator CS6 Portable.Evidence grew that many of the minerals being mined in the Democratic Republic of the Congo ended up, after trading hands countless times, in factories producing goods for major US technology companies. "One of the issues that NGOs helped bring to light was about conflict minerals, which fueled the Congolese Civil War of the 1990s - widely considered the deadliest war since World War II. "We would not see companies making so much effort. The results, however, have been mixed."I applaud the efforts that NGOs have made," said Michael Rohwer, Information and Communications Technology Associate Director at Businesses for Social Responsibility. Many were marketed as solutions, aimed at making it easier to monitor and respond to human rights and environmental violations along supply chains. This led to the development of an array of supply chain technologies - RFIDs, remote sensing, satellite monitoring, even blockchain-based tools.And this happened just two years after the horrific Rana Plaza factory collapse, in which more than 1,100 people - mostly women - died while producing clothing in unsafe conditions for global brands including Joe Fresh, Primark and Benetton. That same year, massive wildfires fueled by rampant deforestation connected to palm oil, the most consumed food oil in the world, burned 2.5 million hectares of rainforest. In 2015, analysis of these disclosures found that three years after the regulations had passed, few companies could accurately source their minerals. This was followed shortly by the passing of the California Transparency in Supply Chains Act, which went even further and required all large companies doing business in the state to disclose their efforts to eradicate slavery and human trafficking from their direct supply chains." really caused companies to think more about how they could collect information about what is necessary to drive transparency in the supply chain," said Rohwer.Thinking about change was not enough.
![]() Knoll Light Factory Serials Download Adobe IllustratorOn the hardware side are technologies like RFIDs, which can increase supply chain visibility, and newer tools like Stardust, a dustlike tracker that helps assess the authenticity of goods along a supply chain and is nearly impossible to detect and alter - some believe it could address illegal timber.There are also software tools that allow for better aggregating, analyzing, visualizing and verifying of supply chain information, like Global Traceability's Radix Tree, a platform that enables buyers to collect information from suppliers to establish a chain of custody. "Even two degrees of separation is enough to change the leverage formula."In response to both the documented atrocities and the new laws, a plethora of tools meant to illuminate supply chains emerged. One of the early complaints, and reasons that many companies could not fully comply with Section 1502, was the sheer difficulty of mapping those intentionally complex supply chains."There is definitely a decline in leverage the further away you are from a particular company," said Rohwer. It turned out that fixing supply chains was a lot harder than expected. Orbital Insight and Descartes Labs are focusing primarily on the commercial applications of their products first and not yet doing much on the ethical side, though both plan to. Mostly, companies are using satellites for other purposes: to better understand crop yields or to spy on a competitor's supply chain. GLAD automatically analyzes data and sends alerts when a particular region in the tropics looks like it is being deforested.So far, though, the applications of satellites to make information more ethical and transparent has been limited to a few initiatives like GLAD. The technology itself is getting far more powerful: Satellites are both increasing technological capability in quality (the amount and breadth of data they can collect) and quantity (how often they can collect data over a piece of the earth).This has led to some important breakthroughs, such as the Global Land Analysis and Discovery (GLAD) alerts system launched by the nonprofit World Resources Institute, which works with Orbital Insight. "For many of them, however, the jury is still out on how effective they can be."One of the areas that has seen the most positive media attention is remote sensing, at the forefront of which are companies like Orbital Insight and Descartes Labs, which both see potential for their technologies to help fill information gaps in supply chains around the world. "We're seeing a lot of progress in attempts to utilize technology," said Kilian Moote, Project Director for KnowTheChain, a Humanity United project. Download serum plugin free"It's specifically focused on a compliance checklist to understand what is happening in a factory and doesn't really get into any wider analysis, which can reflect more the reality on the factory floor."Auditing is haphazard and unreliable, with well-documented cases of fake reports. It addresses one of the key weaknesses of the system that was implemented after the initial wave of revelations about working conditions in the 1990s, in which auditors enter factories at regular intervals and conduct checklist walk-through examinations."Auditing just does not have that many data points," said Beth Holzman, Director of Engagement and Operations at Laborlink. For example, one of the most successful tools is the self-described tech-agnostic Laborlink, a product of Good World Solutions, which supplies workers around the world with a secure, anonymous method of providing information about working conditions in their factories. Simple tools with actionable plans could be more effective than fancy, expensive ones. "And at that point we'll know if there is a market for these tech solutions."It's not even clear that technology itself matters. The question is, will they move beyond pilots, and can they get to a place where wide-scale adoption is not only possible but actually happening?" said Moote. It is because of them that we have supply-chain accountability legislation, and it's often them, or their partners on the ground, who are spreading the word about unsafe working conditions or illegal deforestation."Improvements in technology at the local level have been instrumental in communities' ability to participate in the protection of their forests," said Emma Lierley, Forest Communications Manager with Rainforest Action Network. "That information can be shared with factory managers to say, 'How would you actually work to improve supply chain practices?'"Other low-tech actors making a difference are NGOs. "They have the ability to provide data and can use tech to better their own engagement."This approach has been successful in creating knowledge about what's taking place in factories and giving companies that care an opportunity to address those concerns."We've reached a million workers and gathered 3.5 million data points," said Holzman. In Cambodia or India, this can be simple feature phones with SMS capability, whereas in China, the ubiquitous app WeChat is commonly used."We really are trying to ensure that, in the use of technology, we're putting workers at the heart of this process," said Holzman. It utilizes whatever technology people already have. As factories and plantations can have upward of 1,000 workers, this can be woefully inadequate.Laborlink thrives partly because it does not rely on the latest smartphones or high-tech, remote-sensing technology. ![]()
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