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Effects of pesticides on the right to food 2017, para. 52
- Paragraph text
- The responsibility of corporations is specified in the Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights. In addition to setting out States’ existing obligations to protect against business-related human rights abuse and ensure access to remedy for victims, the Guiding Principles specify the independent responsibility of businesses to respect human rights, that is to avoid and address adverse human rights impacts linked to their operations. While businesses are not directly bound by international human rights treaties, the Guiding Principles provide a broadly agreed normative basis to assess corporate activity.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Equality & Inclusion
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Financialization of housing and the right to adequate housing 2017, para. 17
- Paragraph text
- The Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights has suggested that the obligation to fulfil incorporates both an obligation to facilitate and an obligation to provide. In the context of the critical relationship between housing and financial markets, the articulation of a State's fulfilment obligation to not only provide housing when needed but also to facilitate the implementation of the right to housing is helpful in capturing the wide range of States' obligations to ensure that financial markets and the actions of private investors work towards the realization of the right to adequate housing.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Equality & Inclusion
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Financialization of housing and the right to adequate housing 2017, para. 55
- Paragraph text
- The mere threat of those kinds of claims can have a directive effect on State housing policy. Investment treaty arbitration frequently involves millions of dollars in damages, and thus acts as a disincentive for States to enact and enforce any regulatory measures restricting the profitability of housing or real estate assets purchased by foreign investors. Those whose right to adequate housing may have been infringed by States' failures to regulate the activities and speculative profits of foreign investors, on the other hand, have few if any avenues of redress, and certainly no ability to seek damages in the amounts claimed by private investors. The imbalance in access to remedies creates an imbalance in State accountability and priorities.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Financialization of housing and the right to adequate housing 2017, para. 50
- Paragraph text
- In many developing and emerging economies, the World Bank and other international and regional financial institutions continue to actively promote the financialization of housing as the dominant strategy for addressing the critical need for housing, despite evidence that such strategies fail to provide housing options to the households that are most in need, and lead to greater socioeconomic inequality. World Bank development programmes concentrate on what they consider to be the building blocks of housing finance such as title registration, foreclosure procedures, lending regulations, long-term funding instruments, and improving the liquidity of mortgage assets in order to reduce the costs of credit-risk underwriting for investors. Those policies, combined in many cases with austerity measures that reduce social protection and housing programmes, have meant that development programmes frequently support the emergence of a financialized housing system that may be at odds with States' obligations to prioritize the needs of those in the most desperate circumstances.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Extreme poverty and human rights on universal basic income 2017, para. 7
- Paragraph text
- There is a strong risk that when confronted with the challenge of addressing economic insecurity the human rights system will proceed in zombie mode. It will keep marching straight ahead on the path mapped out long ago, even as the lifeblood drains out of the enterprise. Its supervisory and monitoring organs will address themselves ever more insistently to State actors that have made themselves marginal, and they will continue to demand respect for standards that have long since been overtaken by the grim realities of global supply chains. For the most part, the human rights machinery is cumbersome, lacking in agility, and poorly placed to develop new thinking in such contexts. But it will need to do so if it is to remain relevant.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- All
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Strengthening voluntary standards for businesses on preventing and combating trafficking in persons and labour exploitation, especially in supply chains 2017, para. 62b
- Paragraph text
- [Given the potential that multi-stakeholder initiatives and industry coalitions may have to cascade corporate policies on eliminating trafficking in persons across sectors, and the role the Special Rapporteur can play in providing a powerful and neutral platform, the mandate holder will continue to explore further engagement with such initiatives, specifically to:] Enhance workers’ voices within the standard-setting process, and in monitoring mechanisms, through the identification of good practices in workers’ participation in monitoring schemes and the development of capacity-building programmes;
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on trafficking in persons, especially in women and children
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Violence
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Service regulation and human rights to water and sanitation 2017, para. 32
- Paragraph text
- Regulatory frameworks may also be characterized by a broad spectrum of contractual arrangements between governments which formally delegate service provision, and third parties. In such cases, the instrument delegating service provision defines the relationship between the public asset owner and the service provider and sets service standards. In the case of State-owned companies, management will usually be delegated via legislation, decrees or contracts, while public authorities will often enter into contracts with private providers. Contracts may differ according to the ownership of assets, the responsibility for capital investments, the allocation of risks, the responsibility for operations and maintenance, and the typical contract duration. France is a country with a long history of this type of regulation, established through private-sector participation contracting with local government.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the human rights to safe drinking water and sanitation
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Service regulation and human rights to water and sanitation 2017, para. 69
- Paragraph text
- The situation becomes far more complex when monitoring informal small-scale providers. Piped systems are often not available to rural households or to those living in informal settlements in urban areas (see A/70/203, para. 64). This represents a significant problem of inequality in access, as people living in these areas, who are often poorer, have to rely on alternatives that are often of lower quality and that tend to cost far more. In these situations, some types of services, such as informal shared or communal facilities and unregulated individual on-site solutions, are seen as necessary short- to medium-term solutions. However, without suitable regulation and monitoring, none of these services can be guaranteed to comply with human rights standards.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the human rights to safe drinking water and sanitation
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Equality & Inclusion
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Access to information in international organizations 2017, para. 20
- Paragraph text
- The media coverage of intergovernmental organizations is also radically different from the day-to-day or hour-to-hour reporting in domestic environments. Considering the size of the international bureaucracy, in comparison to the coverage in robust media environments of national or local governance, very few reporters cover the United Nations or other intergovernmental organizations on a dedicated basis. Those who do cover them must often work hard to get their editors, and certainly their readers, to understand the relevance of these institutions to their own lives and public policy preferences. As a result, members of the international civil service do not find themselves under the journalistic microscope in the same way that domestic bureaucrats do (or should) around the world. Such oversight may be pursued by Member States from time to time, particularly in areas of budgeting, but the difficulty of accessing information about the workings of intergovernmental organizations exacerbates the already difficult situation in terms of the pursuit of accountability at the international level. In this kind of atmosphere, every newspaper or magazine article that uncovers a problematic practice on the part of an intergovernmental organization may be taken as an attack on the institution as a whole, largely because the work of these institutions is so removed from the lives of members of the public. Fixing that, and adopting robust access-to-information policies, is one step towards better understanding, accountability, oversight and protection of the missions of intergovernmental organizations.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Service regulation and human rights to water and sanitation 2017, para. 33
- Paragraph text
- A number of human rights challenges arise when regulating service provision by contract, particularly when non-State actors are involved. Such challenges include guaranteeing transparent and democratic decision-making, addressing power asymmetries in the bidding and negotiation process, ensuring affordable services, avoiding disconnections in cases of inability to pay, ensuring monitoring and accountability, and addressing corruption. It is also important that contracts, which are normally valid for decades, can be reviewed and adapted over time.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the human rights to safe drinking water and sanitation
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
State obligations under the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in the context of business activities 2017, para. 5
- Paragraph text
- In addition, under international standards, business entities are expected to respect Covenant rights regardless of whether domestic laws exist or are fully enforced in practice. The present general comment therefore also seeks to assist the corporate sector in discharging their human rights obligations and assuming their responsibilities, thus mitigating any reputational risks that may be associated with violations of Covenant rights within their sphere of influence.
- Body
- Committee on Social, Economic and Cultural Rights
- Document type
- General Comment / Recommendation
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
The role of digital access providers 2017, para. 30
- Paragraph text
- Telecommunications providers (Telcos) and ISPs (collectively referred to in the present report as “providers”) offer a diverse range of services. While they principally operate and sell access to the series of networks that comprise the Internet, they also enable users to communicate and share information through mobile services and traditional landlines (see A/HRC/32/38, para. 16). While providers remain State-owned in many regions, a growing number are now privately established and managed. The industry is also increasingly multinational: some of the world’s biggest providers operate networks in multiple countries and regions, often through partnerships with domestic companies or their own subsidiaries.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Strengthening voluntary standards for businesses on preventing and combating trafficking in persons and labour exploitation, especially in supply chains 2017, para. 29
- Paragraph text
- The first of the two consultations targeted participants in multi-stakeholder initiatives and industry coalitions; the second was aimed at representatives from companies that perform social audits and other types of supply chain assessments.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on trafficking in persons, especially in women and children
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Service regulation and human rights to water and sanitation 2017, para. 53
- Paragraph text
- Inextricably linked to the question of setting affordability standards for water and sanitation services is the issue of disconnections. Regulatory frameworks should set an outright prohibition on disconnections due to inability to pay.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the human rights to safe drinking water and sanitation
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Equality & Inclusion
- Water & Sanitation
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Strengthening voluntary standards for businesses on preventing and combating trafficking in persons and labour exploitation, especially in supply chains 2017, para. 22
- Paragraph text
- In 2012, an executive order aimed at strengthening protections against trafficking in persons in federal contracts was signed in the United States. The new amendments to the Federal Acquisition Regulation include further due diligence measures in respect of contractors and address key risk indicators, such as the use of unethical recruitment practices, in particular by prohibiting contractors from charging recruitment fees to workers and from denying employees access to their personal documents.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on trafficking in persons, especially in women and children
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Movement
- Violence
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Strengthening voluntary standards for businesses on preventing and combating trafficking in persons and labour exploitation, especially in supply chains 2017, para. 35
- Paragraph text
- Companies have also addressed sustainability concerns through industry-led initiatives. These are industry associations or coalitions that bring together companies around a voluntary code of conduct or standard and a compliance programme on sustainability issues, including human rights and labour standards. While the modus operandi is similar to that of multi-stakeholder initiatives, there may be differences in the organization of the governance structures, with businesses, including suppliers, playing a stronger role.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on trafficking in persons, especially in women and children
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Equality & Inclusion
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Service regulation and human rights to water and sanitation 2017, para. 28
- Paragraph text
- The role of regulation and monitoring becomes particularly challenging in rural areas and in densely populated informal settlements in urban areas, where large proportions of the population are not served by a piped network and rely on informal small-scale providers, which often operate unregulated and as a result provide poor-quality services at high prices. Given the informal nature of the provision, and the lack of regulation and monitoring, users of such services do not have a complaint mechanism that they can avail themselves of when services are inadequate or unaffordable.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the human rights to safe drinking water and sanitation
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Financialization of housing and the right to adequate housing 2017, para. 39
- Paragraph text
- The financialization of housing has dramatically altered the relationship of States to the housing sector and to those to whom they have human rights obligations. Rather than being held accountable to residents and their need for housing, States' housing policies have often become accountable to financial institutions and seem to pander to the confidence of global credit markets and the preferences of wealthy private investors. Given the predominance of housing-related credit in many economies, domestic housing policy becomes intertwined with the priorities and strategies of central banks and international financial institutions, which are themselves rarely held accountable to States' human rights obligations to ensure access to adequate housing and do not meaningfully engage with rights-holders.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Financialization of housing and the right to adequate housing 2017, para. 70
- Paragraph text
- A number of States, including Austria, China, the Philippines, Thailand and Viet Nam, have instituted restrictions on foreign purchasers of residential real estate. The province of British Columbia in Canada has introduced a 15 per cent foreign homeowner tax. The City of Vancouver recently approved a 1 per cent tax, which would apply to both foreign and domestic investors, on vacant homes in order to address the issue of approximately 20,000 vacant homes in its overheated speculative housing market. Net revenue from those taxes is to be invested in affordable housing initiatives.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Extreme poverty and human rights on universal basic income 2017, para. 4
- Paragraph text
- The neoliberal policies encapsulated in the 1980s-era Washington Consensus can be seen, especially in retrospect, to have greatly exacerbated economic insecurity, whether or not that was the intent. The State was assumed to be intrinsically inefficient and corruption-prone, and this led to constant pressure to shrink all those parts of it that provided social and basic economic services to the populace, while vindicating and reinforcing the State in its role as the regulator facilitating and legitimizing the privatization of the economy. Social security and social protection was transformed, including through the explicit policies of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, into a minimalist notion of “social safety nets” designed to avoid the very worst outcomes and make the State look beneficent while empowering officials dedicated to devising ever more efficient “targeting” mechanisms and to rooting out overinclusion while playing down underinclusion. The objectives of promoting tax reform and prudent fiscal policies turned into a race to the bottom to set the lowest individual and corporate tax rates, attracting businesses through expensive exemptions, turning a blind eye to illegal or unconscionably evasive tax practices, and eliminating estate taxes and other measures that would bring about even minimal redistribution. Privatization was promoted even in relation to what were once seen as basic State functions, such as prisons, education and security. In some States, even the justice system has been partly privatized, whether through onerous court fees for the poor or the channelling of consumer and other complaints into private arbitration.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- All
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Extreme poverty and human rights on universal basic income 2017, para. 39
- Paragraph text
- The past two decades have seen a dramatic increase in cash transfer programmes in low- and middle-income countries, including conditional cash transfers and unconditional cash transfers. The World Bank, which strongly supports conditional cash transfers, defines them as “periodic monetary benefits to poor households that require beneficiaries to comply with specific behavioural requirements to encourage investments in human capital (such as school attendance, immunization, and health check-ups)”. Unconditional cash transfers have no such strings attached. The largest conditional cash transfer in the world is Bolsa Família in Brazil, with more than 70 million beneficiaries, while the largest unconditional cash transfer is Dibao in China, with about 75 million beneficiaries. Conditional cash transfers have long been considered a hallmark of Latin American countries. While African countries have focused more on unconditional cash transfers, conditional cash transfers have expanded in Africa in recent years, albeit with relatively “soft” conditions attached.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Strengthening voluntary standards for businesses on preventing and combating trafficking in persons and labour exploitation, especially in supply chains 2017, para. 18
- Paragraph text
- Notable examples of this are the California Transparency in Supply Chains Act of 2010 in the United States, which came into effect in January 2012, and the Modern Slavery Act of 2015 in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Under the California Transparency in Supply Chains Act, retail sellers and manufacturers with over $100 million in annual worldwide gross receipts who do business in the state, regardless of whether or not they are headquartered in California, are required to disclose their efforts to eradicate slavery and human trafficking from their direct supply chains for tangible goods offered for sale. In accordance with the Act, companies concerned must report on their efforts in five different areas: verification, auditing, certification, internal accountability and training.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on trafficking in persons, especially in women and children
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Violence
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Strengthening voluntary standards for businesses on preventing and combating trafficking in persons and labour exploitation, especially in supply chains 2017, para. 20
- Paragraph text
- Both Acts, while considered legislative breakthroughs in developing business accountability for non-financial obligations, are nonetheless not exempt from criticism. The Modern Slavery Act has been criticized for allowing United Kingdom-based companies to hide their supply chains as long as the goods they produce do not enter the United Kingdom, and the California Transparency in Supply Chains Act is considered insufficient, as it requires companies only to report their efforts with no regard for the quality of the effectiveness of the measures taken to eliminate trafficking in persons from their supply chains. In 2015, the Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery, including its causes and consequences presented a report to the Human Rights Council (A/HRC/30/35) in which those two domestic efforts were further analysed.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on trafficking in persons, especially in women and children
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Violence
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
State obligations under the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in the context of business activities 2017, para. 16
- Paragraph text
- The obligation to protect entails a positive duty to adopt a legal framework requiring business entities to exercise human rights due diligence in order to identify, prevent and mitigate the risks of violations of Covenant rights, to avoid such rights being abused, and to account for the negative impacts caused or contributed to by their decisions and operations and those of entities they control on the enjoyment of Covenant rights. States should adopt measures such as imposing due diligence requirements to prevent abuses of Covenant rights in a business entity’s supply chain and by subcontractors, suppliers, franchisees, or other business partners.
- Body
- Committee on Social, Economic and Cultural Rights
- Document type
- General Comment / Recommendation
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
State obligations under the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in the context of business activities 2017, para. 35
- Paragraph text
- Improved international cooperation should reduce the risks of positive and negative conflicts of jurisdiction, which may result in legal uncertainty and in forum-shopping by litigants, or in an inability for victims to obtain redress. The Committee welcomes, in this regard, any efforts at the adoption of international instruments that could strengthen the duty of States to cooperate in order to improve accountability and access to remedies for victims of violations of Covenant rights in transnational cases. Inspiration can be found in instruments such as the International Labour Organization (ILO) Maritime Labour Convention, 2006, in force since 2013, which establishes a system of harmonized national legislation and inspections both by flag States and by port States upon complaints of seafarers on board ship when the ship comes into a foreign port; or in the ILO Domestic Workers Convention, 2011 (No. 189) and the ILO Domestic Workers Recommendation, 2011 (No. 201).
- Body
- Committee on Social, Economic and Cultural Rights
- Document type
- General Comment / Recommendation
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Development cooperation and the human rights to water and sanitation 2017, para. 66
- Paragraph text
- Improvements to partner States’ water and sanitation services funded through development cooperation, even when provided without an obligation for full repayment, often entail an increased need for revenues from tariffs or taxes to keep those services operational and sustainable in the long term. Some funders request or even impose an obligation on partner States to fully or partially recover the costs to operate and maintain such systems through tariffs. Consequently, depending on how tariffs for water and sanitation services are set upon completion, these projects can have an impact on affordable access to services. When funders impose conditionalities requiring full cost recovery through tariffs and the result is higher service fees for users, the affected users must be able to petition the amount of the tariff and seek recourse. If they are not able to do so, the public authorities are therefore not protecting users from the adverse impact of unaffordable services, and the funder shares responsibility for facilitating the creation of such circumstances.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the human rights to safe drinking water and sanitation
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Water & Sanitation
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Strengthening voluntary standards for businesses on preventing and combating trafficking in persons and labour exploitation, especially in supply chains 2017, para. 62c
- Paragraph text
- [Given the potential that multi-stakeholder initiatives and industry coalitions may have to cascade corporate policies on eliminating trafficking in persons across sectors, and the role the Special Rapporteur can play in providing a powerful and neutral platform, the mandate holder will continue to explore further engagement with such initiatives, specifically to:] Identify good practices, and draft guidance and recommendations, for the establishment of corporate grievance mechanisms and remediation that address the needs of workers effectively;
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on trafficking in persons, especially in women and children
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Violence
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Extreme poverty and human rights on universal basic income 2017, para. 19
- Paragraph text
- In the United States of America in the 1960s, Milton Friedman advocated a negative income tax, a concept that bears a close resemblance to a basic income. In the late 1960s, Martin Luther King Jr. called for a guaranteed income as the solution to poverty. And by the end of that decade, Richard Nixon, the then President, came close to implementing a universal income supplement, but the scheme was defeated in the Senate by conservatives who thought the programme was too expensive and by liberals who thought the benefit was too low.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Poverty
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
State obligations under the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in the context of business activities 2017, para. 33
- Paragraph text
- In discharging their duty to protect, States parties should also require corporations to deploy their best efforts to ensure that entities whose conduct those corporations may influence, such as subsidiaries (including all business entities in which they have invested, whether registered under the State party’s laws or under the laws of another State) or business partners (including suppliers, franchisees and subcontractors), respect Covenant rights. Corporations domiciled in the territory and/or jurisdiction of States parties should be required to act with due diligence to identify, prevent and address abuses to Covenant rights by such subsidiaries and business partners, wherever they may be located. The Committee underlines that, although the imposition of such due diligence obligations does have impacts on situations located outside these States’ national territories since potential violations of Covenant rights in global supply chains or in multinational groups of companies should be prevented or addressed, this does not imply the exercise of extraterritorial jurisdiction by the States concerned. Appropriate monitoring and accountability procedures must be put in place to ensure effective prevention and enforcement. Such procedures may include imposing a duty on companies to report on their policies and procedures to ensure respect for human rights, and providing effective means of accountability and redress for abuses of Covenant rights.
- Body
- Committee on Social, Economic and Cultural Rights
- Document type
- General Comment / Recommendation
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Effects of pesticides on the right to food 2017, para. 51
- Paragraph text
- Businesses, whose decisions “can profoundly affect the dignity and rights of individuals and communities”, also have human rights responsibilities. Yet the State-centric nature of the human rights regime largely fails to account for the considerable role that the business sector plays in the violation of human rights. The inability of the regime to address non-State actors is particularly problematic given that the pesticide industry is dominated by a few transnational corporations that wield extraordinary power over global agrochemical research, legislative initiatives and regulatory agendas.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Food & Nutrition
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph