Strengthening Worker Rights and Well-Being in Agriculture
Through certification, landscape and community programs, tailored supply chain services, and advocacy, we are helping to protect and promote the rights of farmworkers around the world.
Home / Issues / Human rights / Page 26
The production of many commonly traded goods—coffee, chocolate, tea, bananas, palm oil, and timber—often involves human rights abuses. While progress has been made in recent years, thorny problems such as child labor, forced labor, poor working conditions, low wages, gender inequality, and the violation of Indigenous land rights are still embedded in many supply chains.
Advancing the rights of rural people goes hand-in-hand with improving planetary health. Project Drawdown cites gender equality, for instance, as one of the top climate solutions, and in our own work, we have seen that farmers and forest communities can better steward their land when their human rights are respected. Everyone deserves to live and work with dignity, agency, and self-determination—and promoting the rights of rural people is key to a sustainable future.
Improving lives and promoting rights of rural communities is a central part of our mission. Our field results, backed by independent studies, demonstrate, for instance, that workers on certified farms are more likely to enjoy better working conditions and important protections.
of workers on Rainforest Alliance Certified tea estates in Tamil Nadu, India, receive paid annual and sick leave*
In Tamil Nadu, India, a study of 300 farmworkers on seven Rainforest Alliance Certified tea estates and one noncertified estate found a significantly higher percentage of workers on certified estates had contracts and annual paid leave, sick leave, and maternity leave.
*Source: Lalitha N, Nelson V, Martin A, Posthumus H. 2013. Assessing the poverty impact of sustainability standards: Indian tea. Natural Resources Institute, University of Greenwich, London.
of Rainforest Alliance Certified banana farms studied in Colombia have a health and safety professional for their workers*
A study of 13 newly certified banana plantations in Colombia found health and safety professionals to be practicing on all the farms. These professionals identify risks, conduct trainings, and facilitate medical exams. 50 percent more managers on certified farms than non-certified also reported providing in-kind health benefits to permanent workers.
*Based on 2018 survey of newly certified farms in Colombia (Beekman, G. M. Dekkers, and T. Koster (2019). Towards a sustainable banana supply chain in Colombia; Rainforest Alliance certification and economic, social and environmental conditions on small-scale banana plantations in Magdalena, Colombia. Wageningen, Wageningen Economic Research, Report 2019-019: 1-49)
The Rainforest Alliance brings together producers, companies, governments, nonprofit organizations, and consumers to advance human rights in the landscapes where we work. We work both to transform business practices and government policy, as well as promote the rights of our partner communities within our certification system and sustainable development initiatives.
Through certification, landscape and community programs, tailored supply chain services, and advocacy, we are helping to protect and promote the rights of farmworkers around the world.
Addressing human rights abuses in agriculture and forestry is a key focus of our work to make responsible business the new normal.
We can all play a crucial role to ensure that all children grow up in dignity. So, who’s with us?
Meet 5 incredible women in sustainability who have successfully transformed their communities and the landscapes around them.
This document profiles five major tourism businesses in Latin America that are working towards sustainability. Four hotels and one tour operator that have participated in the Rainforest Alliance’s sustainable tourism program present their main challenges and achievements, including their relationships with indigenous cultures, participation in community development activities, efforts to conserve biodiversity, and their inclusion […]
This report describes work undertaken to improve community forest enterprise competitiveness in Mexico as a means to local economic development and forest conservation. Over a three-year period, the Rainforest Alliance facilitated increased investment while providing technical assistance in value-added processing for a medium-sized indigenous community forestry operation in the northern state of Durango. As a […]
An economic impact study of five tourism businesses in Granada, Nicaragua, shows that sustainable tourism provides quality employment, promotes gender equity and benefits the local economy.
The Center for International Forestry Research created a methodology to disseminate information about the production and marketing of non-timber forest products (NTFPs) to improve the livelihoods of small, isolated landowners and promote biodiversity conservation in the Brazilian Amazon. With support from the Rainforest Alliance’s Kleinhans Fellowship, this project aimed to make market research available to […]
Understanding complex linkages between social and ecological systems and their resilience to external shocks is essential to promote the sustainable management of natural resources. This project, funded by the Rainforest Alliance’s Kleinhans Fellowship and directed by a graduate student researcher at the University of Florida, explored the resilience of Brazil nut (Bertholletia excelsa) production to […]
The Universidade de São Paulo in Brazil evaluated the motivations, opportunities, problems, and consequences of trade partnerships or agreements established between forest communities and corporations, for the commercialization of non-timber forest products (NTFPs). Ongoing corporate-community partnerships at both the community and corporate level were examined, as well as policies that could prompt beneficial impacts while […]