Canada watchdog probes Nike, gold mining company over Uighur forced labour claims

Toronto: Canada’s human rights watchdog has opened an investigation into the subsidiary of the global sportswear major Nike and a gold mining company because of allegations their supply chains or operations in China are using or benefitting from Uighur forced labour.

In a release issued on Tuesday, Canadian Ombudsperson for Responsible Enterprise (CORE) announced the “launch of two separate investigations into allegations of Uighur forced labour in the supply chains and operations of two Canadian companies”.

The companies were identified as Nike Canada Corp and Dynasty Gold Corporation.

The decision to launch the investigation was taken after the completion of initial assessment reports into the two companies. These reports related to two of 13 admissible complaints about the overseas operations of Canadian companies. The complaints were filed by a coalition of 28 civil society organisations in June 2022.

The report related to Nike Canada details the allegation that it has supply relationships with Chinese companies “identified as using or benefitting from the use of Uighur forced labour”. The company, the CORE release said, “maintains that they no longer have ties with these companies and provided information on their due diligence practices”.

The second report states that the Canadian mining company “benefited from the use of Uighur forced labour at a mine in China in which Dynasty Gold holds a majority interest. Dynasty Gold’s response to the complaint is that it does not have operational control over the mine and that these allegations arose after it left the region”.

“I have decided to launch investigations into these complaints in order to get the facts and recommend the appropriate actions”, CORE Ombudsperson Sheri Meyerhoffer said.

“I have not pre-judged the outcome of the investigations. We will await the results and we will publish final reports with my recommendations,” she added.

As to the pending 11 complaints, she said CORE will publish the initial assessment reports in the weeks ahead with corresponding decisions on how to move each complaint forward.

Nike, according to the complaint, allegedly has supply relationships with several Chinese companies that the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) identified as using or benefiting from Uighur forced labour. The companies were identified as Qingdao Taekwang Shoes Co Ltd, Haoyuanpeng Clothing Manufacturing Co Ltd, Esquel Textile Co Ltd, Qingdao Jifa Group, Huafu Fashion Co Ltd, and Texhong Textile Group.

Nike has stated it does not source products from Xinjiang and that they have confirmed with their contract suppliers that they are not using textiles or spun yarn from the region.

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