You're reading: ‘Straight Talk’ tackles role of human rights for responsible firms

What distinguishes responsible businesses from irresponsible businesses when it comes to human rights?

Four specialists in business and one in human rights gathered on March 20 to answer this fundamental question at the Fedoriv Hub in Kyiv during the Kyiv Post’s fourth Straight Talk public discussion.

Maybe was it a little odd to see three people respectively representing the pharmaceutical, alcohol and sugar industries joining a panel to address human rights. However, their experience of high-level management brought the practical touch needed for such a topic.

The discussion was moderated by Oleksandr Markov, a counsel at Redcliffe Partners law firm.

Responsibility in rights

A responsible business is — according to all panelists — one that respects the rules and considers profit to be secondary.
Dmytro Shymkiv, the executive chairman of the Ukrainian big pharmaceutical company Darnitsa, considers that this must be established from the very start.

“Irresponsibility of the company usually starts with the shareholders. The owners define the principles and the vision of the company,” said Shymkiv.
Evgeny Shevchenko, managing director of Carlsberg Ukraine, on the other hand, believes that shareholders are not necessarily involved in making a company responsible, and that it is the operational aspect of the company that ensures that.

Over the long haul

Shevchenko was clear that human rights always comes first.

He told the story of a supplier in Uzbekistan who would send clean bottles back to the brewery. As it turned out, his brother being the director of a local prison, the bottles were cleaned by prisoners who did not receive any salary for it, which was in violation of human rights.

So, Carlsberg decided to put human rights before environmental concerns, which illustrated his earlier point about operational management making the difference.

Nataliya Chernyshova, general manager at Mars Ukraine, praised the family values of the company she represents — “people come first, then mutuality” she said.

“When analyses were done, if the company wished to do more business, respecting human rights would help have a bigger impact,” she explained.

The United Nations has specific requirements that Global Compact helps to implement in order for businesses to be sustainable, and responsible.
And even though only a few are related to human rights, those that are related focus a lot on education explained Tetiana Sakharuk, the executive director of the United Nations Global Compact Ukraine.

Nataliya Chernyshova, the general manager of Mars Ukraine, speaks to other panelists during Straigh Talk at Fedoriv Hub on Mar. 20, 2019. (Oleg Petrasiuk)

Self-interest

Yaryna Klyuchkovska, a strategic communications consultant and adviser to the minister of finance in Ukraine, did not believe that companies could either be responsible or irresponsible, instead they act responsibly, or they do not.

This depends greatly on whether it is in their self-interest according to her.

“The only way to ensure that a business will act responsibly is to make it understand that it is in its self-interest,” she said, before adding that it takes strong commitment from shareholders and management to remember where their true self-interest lies.

The business model of a company determines it all she believes.

If the goal is to make as much money as quickly as possible, then the company might not pay as much attention to acting responsibly, however, if the goal is to last in time, then it must.

An idea echoed by Shevchenko who clearly stated that “if a company acts irresponsibly, they will lose market share and will not be able to expand.”

Ukrainian reality

Klyuchkovska believes it to be difficult for companies to totally play by the rules in Ukraine.

“In Ukraine, if you respect human rights, pay all your taxes and employ all your employees legally, you become competitively disadvantaged,” Klyuchkovska said bluntly.

This is not to say that Ukraine is a hopeless case, because as Shymkiv correctly noted: “Human rights violation can happen anywhere in the world, so it depends on how society reacts to it.”

Nevertheless, Ukraine still has a lot of work to do in order to catch up with developed nations where abiding to human rights is more natural.

See more photos online from the Kyiv Post Straight Talk forum in partnership with Redcliffe Partners.