Harvard University, jeans giant Levi Strauss and U.S. think-tank New
America are investigating blockchain as a means to improve labor
welfare.
New America announced Thursday that the U.S. Department of State has
granted $800,000 for a pilot project that will develop a
blockchain-based system to track the working conditions of factory
workers.
The first phase of the project will be launched in the second quarter of
this year to “anonymously and securely” track three factories in Mexico
producing goods for Levi Strauss and employing a combined 5,000
workers. The scheme will monitor the workforce across the factories,
tracking conditions and individuals’ health and well-being.
The blockchain system will be developed by ethereum development studio
ConsenSys based on a well-being index from the Harvard T.H. Chan School
of Public Health’s – the Sustainability and Health Initiative for
NetPositive Enterprise (SHINE).
SHINE director Dr. Eileen McNeely said that most blockchain uses cases
for the supply chain industry revolve around tracking materials, so
building a solution for tracking human conditions is an “exciting
innovation with broad potential for positive impact on worker well-being
worldwide.”
Basing the pilot on ethereum will create a “transparent environment for
workers to securely and anonymously share critical information,”
according to ConsenSys founder Joe Lubin.
“Our goal is to develop, test, and scale a system that could empower
employees, suppliers, and consumers to make informed decisions about
factories, products, and brands,” he said.
The participants are already planning a second phase of the pilot – slated for launch in 2020.
Last week, in a similar development, IBM announced two separate supply
chain projects, built on the Hyperledger Fabric blockchain platform,
aimed to spot illegal activity like child labor in the metals industry.
One is designed to track cobalt traveling from a mine in the Democratic
Republic of Congo to a Ford plant, while the other seeks to monitor
metal shipments from a mine in Mexico.
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