The Centre will support trade unions to leverage national and EU legislation – like the German Act on Corporate Due Diligence Obligations in Supply Chains and EU’s Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD) – to secure workers’ rights across global value chains and corporate operations.
IndustriALL Global Union and UNI Global Union (UNI) are working on this project with their partners in Germany: the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung and the German trade union confederation, DGB. Initial funding has been provided by the ‘Initiative for Global Solidarity’, a GIZ programme supported by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).
The new Competence Centre will serve as a crucial resource, providing capacity building and legal expertise to ensure that human rights due diligence obligations translate into tangible improvements in working conditions across global value chains.
Judith Kirton-Darling, industriAll Europe’s General Secretary, says: “The news about the new Competence Centre is a clear message to the European Commission that has launched a direct attack on corporate accountability with its proposals in the Omnibus package. The aim of the new Competence Centre is to ensure that due diligence laws make global supply chains more resilient, fair, and accountable.
It’s important to bring together expertise and resources so that this Centre can ensure that human rights due diligence laws are not just words on paper but a powerful tool to strengthen workers’ rights and corporate accountability in global supply chains. IndustriAll Europe welcomes the opening of this Competence Centre.”
The Competence Centre will be registered as a non-profit foundation in the Netherlands. It will be launched officially in Q4 2025 and will operate virtually, without a physical location.