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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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Warming to the Idea? Labor Governance and Extreme Heat in Apparel Production

Impacts of Climate Change on Global Apparel Production

How have weather conditions already started to affect the apparel industry and how should the industry adapt? This policy brief builds upon past GLI research and our report co-produced with the IFC and the ILO's Better Work program to present new findings on the impacts of extreme heat and the adaptation responses from employers, workers, their governments and buyers in the global apparel and footwear industry. See our new research here.

Cambodian workers are seen in a local footwear manufacturing plant, with containers of materials in multiple colors sitting in front of workers wearing bandanas and many wearing masks as well.
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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

Draft Working Paper (ILO/GLI) "Beneath the surface: Review of literature and initiatives for identification of forced labour in fishing" (2020)

This Working Paper drafted with support from ILO Fundamentals identifies and brings together what is already known about obstacles to identifying fishers in forced labour and key knowledge gaps in this regard.
Philippine fisherman surrounded by buoys
Draft Working Paper (ILO/GLI) "Beneath the surface: Review of literature and initiatives for identification of forced labour in fishing" (2020)

Social Sustainability in Global Supply Chains: An Empirical Investigation of Freedom of Association and Collective Bargaining

In this article, we seek empirical answers to two research questions: a) What are the typical violations of FOA and CB rights in global supply chains that must be corrected for workers to exercise their voice?
Dignity factory workers producing shirts for overseas clients, in Accra, Ghana
Social Sustainability in Global Supply Chains: An Empirical Investigation of Freedom of Association and Collective Bargaining

NCP at OECD: Is Social Dialogue Part of Fashion's Post-COVID Cure?

NCP and the Strategic Partnership for Garment Supply Chain Transformation led a session sharing NCP's mapping of social dialogue in response to the COVID-19 pandemic at the 2021 OECD Due Diligence Forum.
Logo of the OECD. A globe followed by the letters O E C D.
NCP at OECD: Is Social Dialogue Part of Fashion's Post-COVID Cure?

What Makes a Decent Factory?

Until recently, there has been a lack of data that allowed researchers to distinguish between highly compliant factories and non-compliant ones.
factory workers
What Makes a Decent Factory?

NCP Event: How do we fix trade policy to help workers?

What has to change in U.S. trade policy to improve labor practices in global supply chains? Join the Cornell ILR School's New Conversations Project and Sandra Polaski, Senior Research Scholar at Boston University’s Global Development Policy Center, on 19 January 2021. 
Cargo ship in the ocean with several containers.
NCP Event: How do we fix trade policy to help workers?

COVID-19 and the Garment Industry Brief

The New Conversations Project has published a new research brief with the ILO assessing the impact of COVID-19 on the apparel industry in Asia and the Pacific.
Female garment workers wearing masks.
COVID-19 and the Garment Industry Brief

In The News

Media Mentions

How Climate Change Will Shape Fashion Supply Chains in 2026

Vogue
“The technology to cool workers is not complicated, and the costs are manageable in most countries,” said Jason Judd, executive director of ILR’s Global Labor Institute, sharing his expertise about how the garment industry is addressing climate change and heat stress in factories.
How Climate Change Will Shape Fashion Supply Chains in 2026

Justice for Jeyasre: how a brutal murder led to a better deal for garment workers in India

The Guardian
Sarosh Kuruvilla, academic director of the Global Labor Institute, provides an analysis of the Dindigul labor agreement and comments on why Natchi Apparels may be having difficulty finding new clients.
Justice for Jeyasre: how a brutal murder led to a better deal for garment workers in India

Can the fashion industry adapt to a warming world?

Context
“Workers toiling in 35 or 40 degrees Celsius and high humidity is the return of the literal sweatshop,” says this article about the garment industry and climate change, co-written by Jason Judd, executive director of the Global Labor Institute. The article cites the institute’s “Higher Ground?” report and offers solutions.
Can the fashion industry adapt to a warming world?

Hot Air: How will fashion adapt to accelerating climate change?

Impacts of Climate Change on Global Apparel Production

How have weather conditions already changed in major apparel production centers? In this follow-up to our Higher Ground? reports, we looked at the past twenty years of weather data in our 23 focus cities to try and find that out, as well as ask how workers, brands and retailers, manufacturers and their governments should react and adapt to our warming future in a world of corporate due diligence. Read our findings here.

A flooded area near to Phnom Penh, Cambodia
/global-labor-institute/research-0/gli-hot-air

Higher Ground? Fashion’s Climate Breakdown

Impacts of climate change on global apparel production

In partnership with Schroders, we report the impacts of climate change on global apparel production. In our first report, we track climate change impacts at the global, national, and factory levels. We map fashion's climate vulnerabilities across production centers, and estimate future economic damages from extreme heat and flooding. Our second report examines company-level climate risk, cost, and financing for adaption and just resilience.

Textile workers in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
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Change or Groundhog Day? What new research tells us about what works in global labor governance

2024 GLI Conference Highlights

Samira Rafaela
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