Global supply chains represent an important, yet largely untapped, opportunity for advancing gender equality.
In factories, farms and facilities that produce everything we use, millions of women face systematic barriers: lower wages, workplace harassment, and advancement dead-ends.
These challenges aren't the result of any single company's actions; they're built into how global supply chains have historically operated.
Together, the Global Supply Chain Coalition can change that.
Corporate engagement, cross-sector cooperation and public-private partnerships can contribute significantly to promoting gender equality along these supply chains and initiating sustainable structural change.
Launched at COP30, the Global Supply Chain Coalition (GSCC) offers companies a coordinated and practical framework for developing improving gender equality in supply chains: building better businesses for all women and girls.
The untapped potential of supply chains
We asked WEPs signatories where they wanted to make more impact. Longtime WEPs signatories – already making great progress on gender equality internally – were eager to go beyond their own company walls into their supply chains.
Supply chains extend across continents, touching millions of workers in factories, farms and facilities worldwide. These networks represent an enormous, untapped opportunity for gender equality at scale. Through procurement decisions, supplier partnerships, and industry standards, businesses can shape working conditions throughout their supply chains.
When companies embed gender equality into their procurement practices, they create accountability that cascades through entire industries. Supplier requirements become workforce policies. Audit criteria becomes career advancement programs. Contract terms become cultural change.
This is how supply chains have the power to turn gender equality commitments into measurable outcomes across thousands of facilities and millions of workers: transforming aspirational goals into everyday practice.
Supply chain gender equality is the next non-negotiable standard in sustainable business: companies that ignore it face reputational risk, and those who lead gain competitive advantage.
Collective action through our Coalition
No single country or company can transform global supply chains alone: but together, through collective action, entire industries and their supply chains can be reshaped. Together, we can shape the standards that will define the industry.
In a recent report the International Labour Organization emphasized that “Supply chains can provide significant socioeconomic opportunities for women” but that to “fully realize these benefits, it is critical to address persistent barriers”.
With the support of the Global Supply Chain Coalition more action will be directed toward transformation: ensuring women workers everywhere have equal pay, safe conditions, and real advancement opportunities.
When companies act individually, suppliers face conflicting demands and limited resources to respond. When companies act collectively through this coalition, they can create unified standards, shared tools, and the procurement power to drive real change.
This coalition isn't just about equality - it's about building smarter, more resilient supply chains that futureproof employment and empowerment through the power of collective action.
Watch highlights from the launch at COP30
The Global Supply Chain Coalition is a project powered by the Women's Empowerment Principles in cooperation with—and funded by—the Agency for Business and Economic Development (AWE).
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