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Dignity factory workers producing shirts for overseas clients, in Accra, Ghana

Cooling Before It Got Cool: Case Studies in Heat Adaptation in Southeast Asian Factories

Heat Adaptation in Apparel Factories

A new examination of how apparel factories are adapting to extreme heat while investing in cooling, automation, and climate resilience strategies.

A thermal image of a worker at a station in a garment factory, showing the high heat levels through brighter orange colors at their workstation.
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The Dindigul Agreement to End Gender-based Violence and Harassment

Has It Worked?

This is GLI’s official final assessment of the Dindigul Agreement to End Gender-Based Violence and Harassment at a South Indian apparel factory that could be a model for other factories around the world. 

Large room of garment factory workers
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Global Labor Institute's Climate-Labor Work

GLI Climate-Labor Research

See all of our analyses on the intersection of labor rights and climate change.

GLI climate workers webinar
Read GLI's Climate-Labor Work

Measuring Supply Chain Due Diligence

Labor Outcomes Metrics

Read about the Global Labor Institute's new quantitative metrics that measure labor outcomes—actual impacts for workers.

Workers in Bangladesh
Read more about Measuring Supply Chain Due Diligence

Latest Research and Events

Book "Private Regulation and Labor Standards in Global Supply Chains" Published

NCP Executive Director Sarosh Kuruvilla's book examines the practice of private regulation in respect of labor standards in global supply chains.
Sarosh Kuruvilla Book Cover
Book "Private Regulation and Labor Standards in Global Supply Chains" Published

New Conversations Project Partners with ILO on Grant

Improving working conditions in the dangerous and largely unregulated commercial fishing industry is the focus of the project.
An industrial fishing boat
New Conversations Project Partners with ILO on Grant

Private Regulation of Labor Standards in Global Supply Chains

This paper, published as a chapter in the International Labor Organization's 2021 volume: Decent Work in a Globalized Economy, shares Professor Sarosh Kuruvilla and the New Conversations Project's new research on the limited progress of private regulation over a decade in multiple countries
Garment workers in an Indonesian factory
Private Regulation of Labor Standards in Global Supply Chains

“Repeat, Regain or Renegotiate?” NCP Working Paper No. 2 asks What's the future of apparel?

Cornell NCP's Jason Judd and Lowell Jackson plot the decades-long, pre-pandemic trajectories of apparel industry consolidation, automation, e-commerce, sourcing patterns, and governance of labor practices against three possible scenarios for the industry in the post-pandemic era. This paper also appears as an ILO Better Work Discussion Paper.
Ho Chi Minh map
“Repeat, Regain or Renegotiate?” NCP Working Paper No. 2 asks What's the future of apparel?

Is private regulation working? Book launch with Sourcing Journal on May 25

New Conversations Project and the Sourcing Journal presents a live book launch and debate on Sarosh Kuruvilla's new book, Private Regulation of Labor Standards in Global Supply Chains on Tuesday, May 25.
Sarosh Kuruvilla Book Cover
Is private regulation working? Book launch with Sourcing Journal on May 25

GLI Sourcing Journal Series

The New Conversations Project is publishing a limited series in the Sourcing Journal on latest research findings related to private regulation. These pieces are designed to de-code important new academic research for actors in the global supply chain.
Sourcing Journal Logo
GLI Sourcing Journal Series

In The News

Media Mentions

Resilient Threads: Weaving A Climate-Ready, Regenerative Future for Cotton in India

Observer Research Foundation
A study by ILR’s Global Labor Institute is cited in a discussion about climate change causing problems for the cotton supply chain used by Asia’s fashion sector.
Resilient Threads: Weaving A Climate-Ready, Regenerative Future for Cotton in India

Jason Judd wants the apparel industry to take heat stress very seriously

Big Closets Small Planet Podcast
The garment industry can mitigate health problems and production slowdowns caused by heat stress, but will it? In this podcast episode, Jason Judd, executive director of the ILR Global Labor Institute, shares a nuanced look at climate change adaptation in the garment industry.
Jason Judd wants the apparel industry to take heat stress very seriously

Commentary: How Chinese imports are skirting Trump’s tariffs

Yahoo News
Jason Judd, executive director of the Global Labor Institute, explains that Chinese companies are avoiding Trump tariffs because they are increasingly building their own production facilities outside of China.
Commentary: How Chinese imports are skirting Trump’s tariffs

This week in Trumponomics: The looming import shortage

Yahoo News
Once current inventories are gone, the rest of 2025 could be rocky. “Our perspective in terms of how this will affect manufacturers and workers is that we’ll see a replay of the initial COVID shock,” said Jason Judd, executive director of the Global Labor Institute.
This week in Trumponomics: The looming import shortage

Nike Repeatedly Raised Concerns About Repression in Cambodia. It Expanded Its Factory Workforce There Anyway.

Pro Publica
Brands increasing their orders from Cambodia while raising concerns about labor rights are “obviously mixed messages,” Jason Judd said. “And one message, the purchase order, has a lot more weight than the other. Until those are credibly threatened, the government has no reason to act.”
Nike Repeatedly Raised Concerns About Repression in Cambodia. It Expanded Its Factory Workforce There Anyway.

How Trump’s tariffs could affect Nike and its factory workers

Pro Publica
Jason Judd, executive director of the Global Labor Institute, discusses the impact of tariffs on Nike's workers.
How Trump’s tariffs could affect Nike and its factory workers