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GoodWeave International

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GoodWeave International
Founded1994
FounderKailash Satyarthi

GoodWeave International, is the leading international nonprofit organization working to stop child labor in global supply chains. Founded in 1994 by children's rights activist and Nobel Peace Prize winner Kailash Satyarthi,[1][2][3] it provides a certification program that ensures companies and consumers that the products they purchase are made without child labor. The GoodWeave certification label is the best assurance that no child labor was used in the making of a carpet or home textile product.[4] It is an example of a product-oriented multistakeholder governance group.

Nina Smith, CEO of GoodWeave International explains:

I got involved in the movement to end child slavery because of a boy named Iqbal Masih. Iqbal was a carpet slave at the age of four and escaped servitude at 10. (...) Upon his return to Pakistan, Iqbal’s life was tragically cut short: he was murdered for his activism. His death helped to inspire the birth of GoodWeave. I read Iqbal’s story in a Vanity Fair feature after his death and realized the work that needed to be done in his memory.[5]

Media coverage

Media outlets worldwide have given detailed coverage to GoodWeave. For example, The PBS NewsHour reported, "GoodWeave offers a labeling system that guarantees that no child labor was used in making the rugs."[6] According to the San Francisco Chronicle, the organization "has helped drastically reform the hand-knotted carpet industry in India, Nepal and Pakistan"[7] The Guardian said, "GoodWeave's model centres on extensive monitoring and auditing at every stage of the supply chain,"[8] Responding to concern about violation of children’s rights during the 1980s, human rights organizations in Europe and India, along with UNICEF-India and the Indo-German Export Promotion Council, a German government agency, developed the program to provide assurance to consumers that the oriental carpets they were purchasing were made by adults rather than exploited children, and to provide for the long term educational and rehabilitation of children found working illegally on looms. The program was formally launched in India in the fall of 1994 and expanded into Nepal in 1996. Thereafter, negotiations with programs in Germany, Nepal, India, and the U.S. resulted in the formal creation of the organization.

GoodWeave International Generic Standard

The GoodWeave International Generic Standard requires assessment against three core principles and four progress principles and covers carpets, home textiles and apparel products.

The core principles include:

• Principle A1: No child labor is allowed

• Principle A2: No forced or bonded labor is allowed

• Principle A3: Conditions of work are documented and verifiable

GoodWeave International is based in Washington, DC with affiliated organizations in India, Nepal, Afghanistan, the U.K. and Germany.

References

  1. ^ Chonghaile, Clar Ni (10 October 2014). "Kailash Satyarthi: student engineer who saved 80,000 children from slavery". The Guardian.
  2. ^ Davidson, Amy (10 October 2014). "A Fitting Nobel for Malala Yousafzai and Kailash Satyarthi". The New Yorker.
  3. ^ Lakshmi, Rama (10 October 2014). "Who is India's Kailash Satyarthi, the other Nobel Peace Prize winner?". The Washington Post.
  4. ^ Lake, Maggie (April 18, 2011). "Is your rug slave-free? Goodweave USA is trying to put a stop to child slave labor practices in Asian rug factories". CNN.
  5. ^ [1]
  6. ^ Lazaro, Fred De Sam (July 31, 2013). "Organization Fights to Unravel India's Widespread Child Labor Abuses". PBS. Retrieved October 25, 2014.
  7. ^ Fornoff, Susan (September 27, 2006). "Righteous carpet making". San Francisco Chronicle. San Francisco. Retrieved March 23, 2011.
  8. ^ Balch, Oliver (August 15, 2013). "Child labour can't be carpeted over by a logo, but it's a step in the right direction". The Guardian.
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