Fainted workers, ISO26000 our comments.
Your Corporate Social responsibility Partner
Our monthly newsletters usually provide analyzes of typical social impact phenomena first before taking a step back to propose a more holistic perspective, making such newsletters more useful in contributing to the factory management of social level in developing countries. But, as we also follow the news, we felt it was important to provide analyses of a recent news story as a case study and the recent final draft release of the ISO 26000.
The Phnom Penh Post, an English-language newspaper, recently reported that more than 500 workers fainted from a chemical spray used at a garment factory in the capital of Cambodia, Phnom Penh.
(See article: Phonmpenhpost or AFP)
This dreadful news, not all that unfamiliar to us, shows once more the importance of a proper management system of safety use of chemicals in factories. Factories usually find it too restrictive to adhere fully to recommendations or government regulations in 1) ensuring their own awareness of the substances and source of the chemicals, 2) informing the workers on the dangers of handling them, and 3) avoiding bulk storage in poorly equipped work spaces. In Phnom Penh, unsurprisingly, the exceeded limit of stored chemicals in a cramped space and the lack of awareness from factory management and workers was a catastrophe waiting to happen. In such cases, common knowledge for developed countries but still rare in countries like Cambodia, a ventilation system is very important to safeguarding workers, buildings and products from such calamitous risks. Thinking, however, that installing a ventilation system will be a simple solution easily solved by garment factories is very myopic. The ventilation system is not THE solution. A proper safety management system that includes monitoring and accounting for the safety handling and storing of the chemicals as well as training of the workers on proper handling accounts for the cumulative effect on the factory, providing a sustainable, effective way of preventing such easily avoidable accidents from recurring.
ISO/DIS 26000 Guidance on Social Responsibility
Issued by the International Standard Organization, the latest ISO 26000 is currently a non-certifiable standard on social responsibility meant to serve as a universal guideline. It is not the first one attempting to tackle the broad topic, but the very structured approach of designing an ISO standard required the collaboration of all stakeholders from a diverse array of relevant international backgrounds including the voices of developing countries. Before the standard is officially “set in stone”, the recent release of the last draft (DIS) strongly clues the public in on what to expect as the final will vary very little (see DIS here)
The 100-page document, mostly written in legalese covers a spanning spectrum of all social responsibility and sustainable development, brought to light a very few important points that differed, or perhaps evolved from previous text on those particular subjects. These points also happen to match the spirit we try to promote every month in this newsletter.
The most important is Chapter 4.4 of this document. Here it returns to center the importance of ethics with a full chapter dedicated to pointing out the difference between being governed by ethics and by law: “...recognizing and addressing situations where local laws and regulations either do not exist or conflict with ethical behaviour...”
Even if the ISO 26000 continues to advocate a strong legal approach as stressed in Chapter 4.6: Respect for the rule of law, Chapter 4.7 states clearly that some local legislation can be against ethics: “in situations where the law or its implementation is in conflict with international norms of behaviour, and where not following these norms would have significant consequences, an organization should, as feasible and appropriate, review the nature of its relationships and activities within that jurisdiction”.
This solidifies the platform to ensure when laws are in clear violation of ethics, organizations may be able to choose a more ethical approach despite deemed unlawful, that laws, representing a system, must not be taken as the absolute truth, and that ethics still plays a pivotal role in interpreting which laws should be implemented.
Another interesting topic included “the responsibility for exercising influence” are also mentioned in chapter 5.2.3, illustrating the need to strengthen the ethical approach.
ISO 26000, probably the first of many to follow, represent an important milestone in raising the concept and actions to follow of social responsibility to a level that will expect all governments, corporations and organizations from around the world to follow, or at the very least, be aware of. One may predict one day all will be required to adhere to a future version instead of just knowing about it.
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Release date: 2009-11-11
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