Apple to employ human trafficking victims in its retail stores

Apple will employ trafficking survivors to work in its retails stores, the technology giant said, after winning an international award for making details of its supply chains public in a bid to help end modern slavery.

Since 2012 Apple says it has reduced the number of underage workers in its extended supply chain, which includes locations where rare earth minerals are mined for use in smartphones.

Labor rights groups had previously criticized Apple and its biggest manufacturing partner Foxconn for excessive overtime, hiring underage workers and failing to provide health insurance.

"As a company whose work touches the lives of so many people, we feel we have an enormous responsibility ... to turn our values into action," Angela Ahrendts, head of retail at Apple, said during Trust Conference in London on Wednesday, which is hosted by the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

The technology company has teamed up with an NGO that will help the victims pass interviews for caretaker and landscaping posts among other roles.

The individuals will not be identified to Apple and will be employed by its suppliers rather than directly. But it intends to monitor the initiative.

Unilever's chief executive, Paul Polman, was also presented with an award in recognition of the work he had done.

But one campaign group described the decision to honor Apple as "a joke".

"Apple may be doing more compared to other companies but that is because it has the resources to do so," said Li Qiang, executive director of China Labor Watch.

"However, Apple isn't doing enough, as forced labor persists in its suppliers' factories in China."

The UN's International Organization for Migration is the NGO involved.

Although the effort is currently limited to jobs with third-party contractors, in time it may be extended to include front-of-house retail staff employed by Apple itself.

"Though we have only just started, we see huge opportunity to be a beacon of hope for trafficking survivors integrating them into our retail team," Ahrendts said in her acceptance speech.

"These efforts are just a part of a broader set of initiatives to eliminate modern slavery from every part of our company, in every part of the world."