Human Rights Due Diligence Built Into Coffee Operations
Plotra records human rights information as part of the cooperative’s everyday producer, workforce, safety, case, and improvement workflow. The workstation follows the same producers throughout their relationship with the cooperative, allowing assessments, actions, and evidence to accumulate over time rather than being repeated for every audit.
The cooperative journey
The workflow keeps child participation, labour conditions, and safety evidence in the operational record. Follow-up is managed through cases, actions, evidence, and verification.
Onboard producer
Capture the producer’s human rights profile.
Assess human rights concerns
Review child participation, labour conditions, and occupational safety.
Create case where follow-up is needed
Assign responsibility and corrective action.
Verify improvement
Collect evidence, close cases, and monitor cooperative progress.
Producer Human Rights Onboarding
Human rights due diligence begins when a producer joins the cooperative. The assessment becomes part of the producer’s permanent operational profile.
Household
- Household composition
- Presence of children under 18
Education
- School attendance
- Reasons for non-attendance
- School costs
- Distance
- Illness
- Farm work
- Other household circumstances
Child participation is recorded distinctly.
Plotra records children’s participation in farming as factual operational evidence. The circumstances are then assessed against age, education, working hours, activities, hazard exposure, and applicable national legal requirements to determine whether they indicate child labour, heightened risk, or the need for cooperative intervention. This approach enables cooperatives to protect children from exploitation while recognising lawful forms of youth participation that support rural households and comply with applicable legal and international standards.
01
Participation Details
- Age
- Frequency of participation
- Average hours worked during school term
- Types of coffee activities
- Impact on school attendance
02
Activities Recorded
- Cherry picking
- Collection
- Sorting
- Drying
- Carrying coffee
- Livestock activities
- Other agricultural work
03
Hazard Exposure
- Mixing pesticides
- Spraying pesticides
- Cleaning spraying equipment
- Machinery operation
- Heavy lifting
- Pruning equipment
04
Assessment Factors
- National legal framework
- Age
- School attendance
- Hours worked
- Type of activity
- Frequency
- Exposure to hazardous work
- Potential child labour concern
Labour and safety records sit with the producer profile.
The producer profile records workforce arrangements and chemical safety conditions on the farm.
Farm Workforce
- External labour
- Labour arrangements
- Permanent workers
- Seasonal workers
- Young workers
- Working hours
- Direct payment practices
- Personal protective equipment
- Employment conditions
Chemical Safety
- Products used
- Application methods
- Persons applying chemicals
- Child exposure
- PPE availability
- Safety training
Labour and safety records sit with the producer profile.
The producer profile records workforce arrangements and chemical safety conditions on the farm.
Farm Workforce
- External labour
- Labour arrangements
- Permanent workers
- Seasonal workers
- Young workers
- Working hours
- Direct payment practices
- Personal protective equipment
- Employment conditions
Chemical Safety
- Products used
- Application methods
- Persons applying chemicals
- Child exposure
- PPE availability
- Safety training
Human Rights Assessment
Following data collection, Plotra reviews the producer profile across child participation, adult labour, and occupational health and safety.
Child participation
Age, school attendance, hours worked, activity type, frequency, hazard exposure.
Adult labour
Working hours, wage practices, occupational safety, PPE, chemical safety training.
Health & safety
Chemical use, workplace safety, unsafe practices requiring improvement.
Case creation
Where concerns are identified, Plotra creates a case for cooperative follow-up.
Cases become action plans.
Every case records responsibility, status, corrective action, evidence, and verification before closure.
Each case records
Producer, risk category, date identified, source, responsible officer, current status.
Corrective action
Child protection, labour improvements, occupational safety, responsible officer, timeline, progress, completion.
Evidence & verification
Farm visits, interviews, photographs, training records, PPE distribution, school confirmation.
Grievance Mechanism
Beyond producer assessments, workers and communities may report concerns directly through Plotra.
Reporters
- Farmers
- Workers
- Family members
- Community members
- Anonymous reporters
Concerns
- Child labour
- Unsafe work
- Chemical exposure
- Wage concerns
- Harassment
- Environmental concerns
Improvement and dashboard visibility
Producers receive practical improvement records while cooperative management monitors progress across the full producer base.
Producer Improvement
- Current good practices
- Recommended improvements
- Completed actions
- Next review
Dashboard
- Producers assessed
- Human rights trends
- Active cases
- Corrective actions
- Verification status
- Improvement progress