IKEA submits action pledge to strengthen child rights

IKEA has submitted an action pledge to accelerate efforts to strengthen child rights in the IKEA supply chain in support of the UN’s designation of 2021 as the International Year for the Elimination of Child Labour.

The announcement was made by Inter IKEA Group, which includes the IKEA franchisor, range, supply and certain manufacturing activities.

The IKEA business has been working for years to tackle child labour in the supply chain. This dates back to the late 90s when the IKEA supplier code of conduct, IWAY, was established. 

The IKEA 2021 Action Pledge strengthens IKEA efforts on child rights within three areas: 

•    Further integrating children’s rights into the existing IKEA due diligence system 
•    Accelerating the work to promote decent work for young workers
•    Partnering up to increase and scale efforts 

“We fully support this action pledge against child labour,” says Julia Olofsson, the Head of Human and Child Rights at Ingka Group. “The elimination of child labour is fundamental to our commitment to children’s rights and we will work together with Inter IKEA Group and our partners to further strengthen our actions to prevent child labour and to support young workers with decent work.”

What Ingka Group is doing
Ingka Group efforts to respect and support child rights goes beyond the prevention of child labour. Ingka Group is committed to being a child friendly retailer which means looking at all aspects of the business from a child's rights perspective through the integration of the Children’s Rights and Business Principles.

For Ingka Group, the Principles mean:

• supporting fair work for young workers, parents and caregivers, while eliminating child labour entirely from the Ingka Group supply chain
• ensuring our IKEA stores and Ingka Centres meeting places are playful and safe spaces for children – for example, by providing Småland crèches at our stores and kid’s centres, and playgrounds and activity areas at our meeting places
• offering safe products for children, and marketing these appropriately
• contributing to a healthy environment for children to live in – both now and in the future – through climate initiatives
• working together with others to strengthen child-friendly and connected neighbourhoods and cities
• reinforcing community and government efforts to respect children’s rights

For further information, journalists and media professionals can contact us at press.office@ingka.com or by calling +46 70 993 6376

Ingka Group (Ingka Holding B.V. and its controlled entities) is one of 12 different groups of companies that own and operate IKEA retail under franchise agreements with Inter IKEA Systems B.V. Ingka Group has three business areas: IKEA Retail, Ingka Investments and Ingka Centres. Ingka Group is a strategic partner in the IKEA franchise system, operating 380 IKEA stores in 32 countries. These IKEA stores had 706 million visits during FY20 and 3.6 billion visits to IKEA.com. Ingka Group operates business under the IKEA vision - to create a better everyday life for the many people by offering a wide range of well-designed, functional home furnishing products at prices so low that as many people as possible can afford it.