CORAL GABLES, FL - As operational transparency becomes more dire and a company’s brand and actions are held hand in hand, no milestone is too small to ensure all components—especially human ones—are upheld. Fyffes is doubling down on its own commitment to respect human rights with multiple milestones this year. The company completed its first-ever corporate-wide Human Rights Impact Assessment in January 2020, aligning with the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, through its partner BSR. Additionally, Fyffes published its first-ever Global Human Rights Policy and Statement.

“We would like to thank BSR for conducting the Assessment and all those employees and stakeholders who contributed to the Assessment through interviews. Fyffes has started work already on implementing our human rights mitigation plan and will provide annual updates of the Human Rights Impact Assessment,” Julie Cournoyer, Fyffes Global Director of Sustainability, commented.

The full scope of Fyffes Human Rights Mitigation Plan outline is as follows:

• Establish and circulate Fyffes Global Child Labour Remediation Protocol
• Continue to engage with existing trade-unions and workers committees in good faith and train all managers on freedom of association
• Implement Fyffes Gender Equality Program, targets and gender-related training; provide training on security and community programs to reduce security threats; conduct community-needs assessments to identify environment and health-related issues and solutions
• Facilitate capacity-building in smallholder and own farm climate resilience
• Continue to engage with and support the Living Wage initiative
• Increase worker training and awareness of the Fyffes Ethics Hotline and extend to suppliers and stakeholders
• Partner with NGOs to reduce Haitian migrant worker vulnerability in Dominican Republic

As a result of the assessment, Fyffes Global Sustainability Steering Committee recently endorsed the Company’s Human Rights Mitigation and Management Plan, according to a press release, which provides a framework to manage, mitigate, and help resolve identified human rights risks.

“Companies are now expected to conduct thorough due diligence on human rights to identify, prevent, and mitigate the human rights-related risks or eliminate human rights risks across their supply chain and remediate any adverse human rights impacts they cause or to which they contribute,” Jenny Vaughan, Human Rights Director at BSR, said.

Vaughan continued, “BSR is pleased to have supported Fyffes in conducting its first company-wide human rights impact assessment and five country-level risk assessments, in accordance with the criteria and requirements of the UN Guiding Principles, which today provide the foundations for Fyffes overall Human Rights policy, strategy and management. Fyffes is leading the way by bringing forward a deep knowledge of its salient human rights risks and has established a detailed action plan to mitigate residual risks and prevent human rights violations related to its activities.”

To read more details on Fyffes commitment and assessment, click here to see the full release.

Congratulations to the Fyffes team on these key steps in its business.

Fyffes