The Centre’s 2025 Annual Report: Advancing Child Rights in Complex Supply Chains

Our 2025 Annual Report comes at a time of growing complexity for businesses operating across global supply chains. Reduced investment, shifting regulatory momentum and increasing scrutiny around Human Rights Due Diligence (HRDD) have created a more challenging environment, while risks, particularly in lower tiers, remain persistent and difficult to address.

Against this backdrop, our work focused on what we know delivers results: practical, collaborative approaches that translate responsibility into action. We continued to support companies in understanding risks across their supply chains, strengthening due diligence, and moving upstream into harder-to-reach areas where visibility is limited but risks are highest.

In 2025, this meant scaling collective action through our Child Rights Action Hubs, expanding child labour prevention and remediation efforts, and supporting companies to open safe, legal pathways for young workers. It also meant demonstrating that investments in areas such as family-friendly workplaces are not peripheral, but central to building stable, resilient and sustainable supply chains.

Our approach remains grounded in a clear principle. Companies are not solely responsible for the root causes of human rights challenges, but they play a critical role in addressing them, particularly where their sourcing practices intersect with vulnerable communities. By combining on-the-ground engagement with practical guidance, we support businesses to take meaningful action that benefits workers, families and children, while strengthening supply chain performance.

This report highlights how that approach translated into tangible outcomes in 2025, from improved capacity in lower-tier supply chains to expanded remediation support for children, and growing engagement from companies operating in complex sourcing environments.

Progress is not always linear, and challenges remain. However, the growing commitment from companies, partners and local actors shows that sustained, collective effort can drive change, step by step, where it matters most.

Download the report