Children's Rights and Business Principles

"While the business and human rights agenda has evolved significantly in recent years, a child rights perspective has not yet been explicitly addressed."

The Children's Rights and Business Principles provide a framework for understanding and addressing the impact of business on the rights and well-being of children. Developed through a participatory process that involved children and adolescents as well as businesses, civil society, and governments across sectors and geographies, the 10 principles are intended to provide inspiration and serve as a guidepost for all businesses in their direct and indirect interactions with children - with what organisers describe as the added value of providing a practical tool for business to take a comprehensive approach to their interactions with children, as well as to view children as key stakeholders. The principles were developed by the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), the UN Global Compact, and Save the Children.

Some context as outlined in the document: "Children employed or affected by a business are often invisible. Typical examples include children working illicitly in the supply chain, children on or around company premises, children employed as domestic workers in employee housing, children exposed to business products, children arrested and detained by security services and children of migrant workers left at home. To date, recognition of the responsibility of business towards children has often focused on preventing or eliminating child labour....[T]he Children's Rights and Business Principles also highlight the diversity of ways in which business affects children. This includes the impact of their overall business operations - such as their products and services and their marketing methods and distribution practices - as well as through their relationships with national and local governments, and investments in local communities."

As detailed in the document, these principles are designed to guide companies on the full range of actions they can take in the workplace, marketplace, and community to respect and support children's rights. They hold that all businesses should:

1. Meet their responsibility to respect children's rights and commit to supporting the human rights of children - actions for businesses are outlined; for example: "Be prepared to communicate externally on their efforts to address the business impact on children's rights in a form and with the frequency that reflect such an impact and that is accessible to its intended audiences. The business should provide sufficient information to evaluate the adequacy of its responses. Such communication should not pose risks to affected stakeholders, personnel or to legitimate requirements of commercial confidentiality."
2. Contribute to the elimination of child labour, including in all business activities and business relationships.
3. Provide decent work for young workers, parents, and caregivers.
4. Ensure the protection and safety of children in all business activities and facilities; for example: "Develop a child protection code of conduct for business operations. Ensure awareness of and ongoing training on the code of conduct."
5. Ensure that products and services are safe, and seek to support children's rights through them.
6. Use marketing and advertising that respect and support children's rights.
7. Respect and support children's rights in relation to the environment and to land acquisition and use.
8. Respect and support children's rights in security arrangements.
9. Help protect children affected by emergencies.
10. Reinforce community and government efforts to protect and fulfil children's rights.

For each principle, a good practice snapshot is provided.

In 11 host cities around the world, face-to-face public consultations were launched in May 2011 to give business, civil society, trade unions, governments, national human rights institutions (NHRI), academia, children, adolescents, and other stakeholders an opportunity to help shape the principles. Also, a Child Participation Strategy was developed by Save the Children and Plan to ensure that children were respected as equal stakeholders and that minimum standards for children's ethical participation were met. Then, consultations were organised with over 400 children, ages 7-17 years, in 9 countries. The goal was to listen to their experiences as students, workers, consumers, sons, daughters, community members, advocates, rights holders, etc. The children also reviewed the draft principles and provided detailed recommendations. In addition, an online questionnaire was circulated to thousands of businesses around the world; over 200 unique contributions from business leaders, non-governmental organisations (NGOs), academics, and government representatives were received through this process.

UNICEF, the UN Global Compact, and Save the Children encourage businesses around the world to utilise the principles, raise awareness, and share their experiences in a number of ways:

• Help raise awareness - Advocate for the principles and increase awareness among employees, business partners, governments, and other stakeholders. Engage with UNICEF country offices and National Committees, Save the Children chapters and Global Compact Local Networks. Reach out to other stakeholder groups including business, children, investors, civil society organisations (CSOs), other initiatives on business and children, governments, labour organisations, stock exchanges, and academia.
• Commit to the principles - Make a public commitment in the company policy.
• Implement the principles.
• Report on progress - Communicate progress in respecting and supporting children's rights by using existing or emerging reporting mechanisms, such as the UN Global Compact's Communication on Progress (COP).
• Promote good practices - Share knowledge, experience, and solutions with other companies and organisations.

In July 2012, UNICEF Panama released and produced a video, which can be seen below, to engage businesses to integrate these principles in their business operation as a mechanism to respect and support children's rights.