Poverty Footprint Study on how the Coca Cola - Oxfam America

9 Value chain:
Empowerment
Headlines
Sugarcane workers are often unable to improve their
living and working conditions. Some retailers and
distributors face similar challenges.
Sugar producers often have little ability to impact sugar
price negotiations when selling their product because of
the oligopolistic structure of the sugar market.
Despite good wages, benefits and job security in the
formal sector jobs in the value chain, unions play a
limited role in both El Salvador and Zambia.
There are limited opportunities for self-employed
distributors and retailers to act collectively due to the
lack of organization within the informal retail sector.
54 Exploring the links between international business and poverty reduction
Empowerment is a difficult concept to measure,
but it is an important dimension of development.
Empowered people participate actively in the
processes that affect their lives, by voicing their
views and influencing decision making. One measure
of the empowerment of workers is the extent to
which they can organize themselves, bargain
collectively and use communications channels
to make their opinions heard.
Empowering people living in poverty is an essential
way to ensure that people benefit from business-led
economic growth. Empowered stakeholders can
also lead to more productive and stable supply and
distribution chains that are better able to weather
adversity. People who are engaged and are heard
can warn businesses of emerging tensions and
potential conflicts, as well as share insights
that strengthen processes and spark product
innovation, and inform collective advocacy efforts
to bring about change.