Men harvest olives in Italy. Sean Perry/Flickr. (CC 2.0 by-nc-nd)
In an attempt to prevent and address exploitation in supply chains, many governments have adopted transparency regulations over the past few years or promoted instruments, such as certifications of quality, aimed at incentivising companies to stay within the bounds of the law while respecting the rights of workers. At the same time, they have aimed at informing consumers about companies’ efforts to prevent labour rights violations and, thus, about the origin and quality of the products they buy.
In Italy, the government has recently launched the ‘network of quality agricultural work’ (‘rete del lavoro agricolo di qualità’). This seeks to develop a list of agricultural companies that respect fair working conditions and to provide them with a certification of quality. While such a network has been welcomed as an important tool to tackle labour exploitation and illegal gang-mastering (caporalato), the approach to labour exploitation on which this instrument seems to rely – and consequently, its efficacy – is highly questionable.
