2012 Best Practices for Government Libraries

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BEST PRACTICES 2012
2. International Labor Organization Conventions 29, 105, 138 & 182: Provisions
ratified by up to 175 countries towards the elimination of forced and child
labor.
3. U.S. FRAGO 06-188: Pentagon issued directive ensuring that the U.S.
Department of Defense to eradicate human trafficking in labor recruiting
practices.
4. European Union Council Decision 2006/618/EC: Requires each EU member
state to adopt measures to prevent and combat trafficking in persons.
5. SAARC Convention on Regional Arrangements for the Promotion of Child
Welfare in South Asia: Calls on all seven members of countries in South Asia
to “eliminate the evil of child labor from the SAARC region.”
CORPORATE RESPONSIBILITY AND GOOD GOVERNANCE:
In the U.S. this year, California enacted a “Supply Chain Transparency Act” that
mandates corporations of a certain size doing business in the state to publicly
disclose what steps they are taking to ensure that their supply chains are free of
trafficked and slave labor. Supporters of the measure estimate that over 3,200
multinational corporations are impacted by this law and subsequently many law
firms are now establishing practices to advise these multi-national corporations to
become compliant. A federal version of this act was introduced in Congress last
year to expand nationally the provisions enacted by California.
LEXISNEXIS DUE DILIGENCE DASHBOARD:
These laws were passed and multi-lateral agreements signed because of the global
public’s heightened awareness about human trafficking, often referred to as a form
of modern day slavery, and our desire to not buy such tainted goods. What limits
our diligence, however, is a lack of credible information that procurement officials
can access to ensure that their supply chains are free of goods produced through
such exploitation. Increasingly, corporate and government procurement officials
are in need of information from trusted sources to help them uncover and manage
potential risks and comply with legislative frameworks and international
conventions. However, supply chains are complicated, and often times it is difficult
to expose the last tier in a process that may span the globe.
Due Diligence Dashboard, a LexisNexis product can assist. DDD synthesizes data
from more than 20 global databases including public records and news and
company filing information to uncover risks in supply chains. For example, a DDD
search of Foxconn, the contractor utilized by Apple to produce its products in China
uncovered 1,500 negative news articles dating back to 1997. As the Apple example
indicates, there are many benefits to accessing this type of information: DDD allows
for a company to make better decisions about its contractors by uncovering crucial
information to avoid devastating and costly risks to the company’s brand.