Glob­al sup­ply chains in the elec­tron­ics sec­tor are com­plex and involve a wide range of actors, work­ing in mul­ti­ple sites, with goods and work­ers cross­ing mul­ti­ple bor­ders. In par­tic­u­lar, min­er­al sup­ply chains are high­ly glob­al­ized, and respon­si­ble sourc­ing of min­er­als, includ­ing tin, tan­ta­lum, tung­sten and gold (3TG), is high on the agen­da of many lead­ing down­stream companies.

While the min­ing indus­try, includ­ing arti­sanal and small-scale min­ing (ASM), sup­ports the liveli­hoods of mil­lions of peo­ple glob­al­ly and plays an impor­tant role in pover­ty alle­vi­a­tion and devel­op­ment, it can also have a neg­a­tive envi­ron­men­tal impact and con­tribute to human rights and labour rights abus­es. Reports of human traf cking, forced labour, and child labour, have raised seri­ous con­cerns for down­stream com­pa­nies about the social cost of doing busi­ness with the min­ing indus­try, espe­cial­ly with­in ASM.

As out­lined in the Unit­ed Nations’ Guid­ing Prin­ci­ples on Busi­ness and Human Rights, busi­ness­es not only have a respon­si­bil­i­ty to pre­vent human rights abus­es, but also to pro­vide reme­dies to vic­tims where harm has occurred. While the elec­tron­ic indus­try has made mean­ing­ful progress to pre­vent human rights abus­es through greater due dili­gence, the devel­op­ment of guid­ance and best prac­tices to help busi­ness­es reme­di­ate adverse human rights impacts when they do occur has been limited.

While sig­nif­i­cant progress has been made on sup­pli­er due dili­gence, reme­di­a­tion for vic­tims remains a new area for the pri­vate sec­tor. IOM’s Guide­lines go beyond due dili­gence; they out­line a Six-Step Process to help com­pa­nies iden­ti­fy the steps to fol­low, the stake­hold­ers to engage with, and the dif­fer­ent fac­tors to con­sid­er to take inci­dents for­ward when vic­tims have been iden­ti­fied in the sup­ply chain:

• Step 1: Ver­i­fy the allegation
• Step 2: Deter­mine the type and lev­el of response
• Step 3: Design the reme­di­a­tion action plan
• Step 4: Imple­ment and mon­i­tor the reme­di­a­tion action plan
• Step 5: Inci­dent closure
• Step 6: Cap­ture lessons learned

The Reme­di­a­tion Guide­lines were devel­oped in con­sul­ta­tion with down­stream com­pa­nies, audit pro­grammes, smelters and refin­ers, gov­ern­ments, inter­gov­ern­men­tal orga­ni­za­tions, NGOs, and IOM experts.

It is our hope that these Guide­lines will serve as a start­ing point for com­pa­nies wish­ing to ini­ti­ate or expand their reme­di­a­tion work.