Weekly Updates Available from Business and Human Rights Database

Librarians are used to conducting business research using the traditional commercial tools such as Factiva, SEDAR, EDGAR, and GSI.

But there are other tools out there that focus on the impact of business activities on human rights, the environment and labour. Business research is incomplete without them. The creation of these new research tools is all part of the movement for "corporate social responsibility".

One of the newest tools was launched in January 2005: the Business and Human Rights Resource Centre, a collaborative partnership with Amnesty International and leading academic institutions.

The Centre currently tracks approximately 2,000 corporations. Corporate profiles include news stories, items about investigations, lawsuits and enforcement actions, as well as official responses. To give people an idea of what this looks like, here is the Centre's Wal-Mart page.

The Centre has also just introduced a new feature, Weekly Updates, which are e-mail alerts with an interesting twist: companies are invited to respond to reports that criticise them, and the responses are included. This is to help keep the updates balanced and encourage companies to publicly address important labour and human rights concerns being raised by civil society organizations such as labour unions, development associations, Third World NGOs, and human rights organizations.