The war in Ukraine, increasing conflict sensitivity, heightened legal scrutiny of business operations in fragile regions, and increasingly challenging operating environments significantly amplify the pressure on businesses to adapt. In conducting business in fragile areas, companies must consider both humanitarian law and human rights, ensuring that their operations do not further complicate conflict situations.
The “Business Operations that Respect Human Rights in Conflicts” project promotes companies’ understanding of their responsibility to support human rights and humanitarian law in fragile and conflict-sensitive areas. The goal is achieved by enhancing companies’ expertise and capabilities, communicating the growing importance of humanitarian law and human rights to business operators, and engaging interested Finns through outreach efforts.
The project’s target groups are Finnish companies engaged in international operations and striving for responsibility, as well as Finns interested in responsible business practices. The project encourages companies to better acknowledge their changing and unstable operating environments and the associated growing responsibility regarding humanitarian law and human rights. Collaboration with companies is also supported by informational efforts targeting Finns interested in responsible business, highlighting companies’ evolving operating environments and the new needs to better understand humanitarian law and human rights.
The project condenses international best practices into concise information packages suitable for Finnish companies. Based on these, communication and training modules are developed for companies, including publications, online articles, seminars, and podcasts. These information packages will also be tailored to meet the needs of Finnish companies. The project also creates communication materials for social media and brings the theme to attention in traditional media as well.
