Workforce Health Across the Value Chain 2025

From fragmentation to shared futures: Scaling through partnership5 Isolated efforts fall short, but shared responsibility across companies, sectors and communities drives durable labour and supply-chain resilience. While awareness of risks is growing and successful pilots are emerging, the response remains fragmented. Most corporate and policy efforts are still limited to specific programmes, regions or tiers of the supply chain. They are often narrow in scope, short in duration and too isolated from core business operations. Efforts thrive when capital is allocated in ways that reinforce system-wide strength. The nature of climate and health risks demands an integrated and collective approach – one that recognizes interdependence across sectors and geographies.129,130 This is especially true in global supply chains, where local issues can become global crises – labour conditions in one region can affect delivery and logistics worldwide. Isolated interventions such as heat-safety protocols at a single factory or insurance access for a select group of workers may improve outcomes locally, but they do little to enhance systemic resilience. For that, coordination is needed. Multistakeholder engagement is essential for navigating market turbulence, managing trade-offs and building long- term competitiveness in future supply chains.131Precompetitive collaboration – where industry peers work collectively on shared systemic challenges without competing on the outcomes – represents a promising strategy to enact meaningful progress.132 Such collaborations allow businesses to align on prosocial goals and co-invest in solutions that address root causes rather than symptoms. These collaborations can shift market norms and reduce the cost and risk of action for individual firms, enabling broader transformation across supply chains. Multinational companies are already working together through a diverse ecosystem of coalitions and alliances committed to sustainability goals, ethical sourcing and greater supply-chain transparency. Numerous industry platforms have emerged, including groups encompassing apparel,133,134,135 hospitality136 and consumer goods,137,138,139 as well as many other individual and cross-sector alliances.140 While some of these efforts centre on standards and principles, an increasing number are evolving to address supply- chain realities by partnering directly with suppliers, factories and communities on the ground. Workforce Health Across the Value Chain: Organizational Insights to Mitigate Risk and Create Sustainable Growth 26