News and Events
Upcoming: October 20-22 2025
National Sustainability Society Conference 2025: Transformative change for a just and sustainable future
University of Notre Dame
Katalyst’s Anne Lally will join Ray Offenheiser, Bennett Freemand and Michael Bride for a panel “Sustaining Sustainability in Turbulent Times: How do we sustain progress on human rights across sectors from companies and investors to governments and civil society” during the 2nd Annual NSS Conference.
TheAnnual National Sustainability Society conference welcomes those in academia, industry, nonprofits, and governments to come together and share contributions that focus on transformative change for a just and sustainable future.
Upcoming: September 25 2025
Climate Week NYC Event:
Too Hot to Fashion?
Katalyst’s Anne Lally will faciliate a panel discussion of experts who will contribute insights on climate impacts on workers, share real-world examples of workers living through the climate crisis, and propose collaborative solutions to strengthen worker resilience and advance a fair transition in the garment industry. Speakers will illustrate the real impacts climate change is having on workers’ health and safety, income, and livelihoods, and will propose and discuss proposals to transition the fashion industry to caring for workers and the climate.
Register here for this hybrid event.
Speakers include:
Kalpona Akter, Executive Director, Bangladesh Center for Workers Solidarity
Jason Judd, Executive Director, Global Labour Institute Cornell University
Giuseppe Cioffo, Advocacy Coordinator, Clean Clothes Campaign
Sonia Mistry, Director Climate & Labour Justice, Solidarity Center
Thulsi Narayanasamy, Director of International Advocacy, Worker Rights Consortium
25 June 2025
Launch of the European Parliament Sustinable Textile Working Group - Brussels
Katalyst’s Martin Curley joined a panel with MEPs including Saskia Bricmont, Lara Wolters and Barry Andrews to help launch the Sustainable Textiles Working Group. During the kickoff event, Katalyst shared our research on designing effective value chain regulations, which often uses the garment industry as a test case for developing policy recommendations.
In the months ahead, the Working Group will focus on a variety of questions related to environmental and human rights sustainability in the garment industry.
22 May 2025
WHICH WAY UP? Regulating global value chains in a rapidly changing landscape
Katalyst, together with our colleagues at the University of Amsterdam Responsible Business Conduct Lab and the ILR Global Labor Institute, hosted a half-day conversation with a small group of civil society and academic experts.
Recent actions – from Trump administration tariffs to the EU Omnibus to across-the-board cuts to international programming – have dramatically changed the environment within which civil society operates when it comes to value chain regulation for labour, climate and environmental issues.
The event provided an opportunity for conversation among experts from a range of civil society and academic disciplines who are working to understand how GVC governance may be impacted by the new context.
7-10 April 2025
Asser Institute Spring Academy
Technologies of sustainability due diligence: Digital tools and global value chain regulations
Katalyst will be presenting at the 2025 Asser Institute Spring Academy in the Hague. Practitioners and academics will critically reflect on the role of digital technologies in the governance of global value chains through the sustainability due diligence process.
See the agenda here, and contact Asser Institute for registration information.
25-27 November 2024
UN Forum on Business & Human Rights Marketplace - Geneva
Katalyst will be participating in the ‘Marketplace’ at the UN Forum on Business & Human Rights in Geneva this year. We’ll be sharing our recent research, and making it easy for Forum participants to access Katalyst materials. Please stop by to discuss any questions you might have or just to say hello!
7-8 November 2024
BWI Building and Wood Workers International 'Global Climate Justice Summit' - Geneva
Katalyst joins more than 100 trade union leaders and allies at BWI – Building and Wood Workers International – Global Climate Justice Summit titled “Building a Just and Equitable Future.” It will be the first-ever climate justice summit led by construction, building materials, wood and forestry workers.
The Future of Global Value Chain Governance conference in Amsterdam was organised by Katalyst Initiative with the support of partners The University of Amsterdam Responsible Business Conduct Lab, and Cornell University ILR Global Labor Institute.
A global group of experts from trade unions, environmental and labour NGOs, government policymaking bodies, and academia came together to start laying the groundwork for the next generation of value chain regulation for a Just Transition.
Visit the conference highlights page >>>
Katalyst’s research was highlighted by Mapped in Bangladesh’s October newsletter. MiB’s data was very helpful the development of our recent Global Garment Workers Count research, and offers an interesting way to augment the survey approaches often used in collecting workforce data. Learn more about MiB’s work here.
Katalyst is excited to welcome two new Board Members: Human Rights Due Diligence expert Hendrine Stelwagen and University of Amsterdam Professor of Private Law Klaas Hendrik Eller. They each bring extensive experience in sustainability and value chains. Katalyst also thanks our former Board Members Katharine Fortin and Hendrik Lindholm, who have joined Katalyst’s group of Expert Advisors.
15 August 2024
Global Garment Workers Count: New Publication
In the fourth paper in Katalyst’s Building Blocks for Governing Global Value Chains series, we attempt to answer the seemingly simple – but to date poorly-documented questions: How many people work in the garment industry, where, and in what value chain stages?
The answers – and what we learned about the quality of global labour force data available to policymakers – has serious consequences for the design of regulations such as the CSDDD or forced labour bans, and for any efforst to develop a Just Transition to a more sustainable industry. Read more.
3 August 2024
Advancing sustainability through supply chain legislation? A policy trilemma
New academic paper from Katalyst and RBC Lab's Luc Fransen
In this new paper, published in Environmental Science: Advances, and building on KI’s Trade Realities paper, we explore how trade flows and the design of new value chain governanance laws may impace policy design.
Policymakers may find the will need to sacrifice one out of three current design features of such legislation: designing legislation unilaterally for their home markets, letting regulation apply to supply chains across the world, or giving firms the ability to freely choose their suppliers. We discuss the different combinations of design options that could advance sustainability in supply chains.
23 May 2024
UvA Responisible Business Conduct Lab Launches
The University of Amsterdam’s Responsible Business Conduct Lab, led by Luc Fransen, officially launched this week. Katalyst is one of the lab’s partner organisations, and advises on a range of projects including The Evolution of Supply Chain Laws, The Effects of Supply Chain Laws and Present and Future Supply Chain Structures and Responsible Business Conduct Policies. We look forward to working with the lab’s team on these and other exciting research project
8-12 April 2024
Technologies of Sustainability Due Diligence: Digital tools and global value chain regulations
Katalyst will be presenting as part of the 2024 Asser Institute Spring Academy.
The academy will gather leading academic thinkers and cutting-edge technological entrepreneurs to equip our participants with the necessary theoretical and practical skills to navigate and critically engage with the growing practical role of digital technologies in the implementation of the due diligence process and the regulation of global value chains.
Concretely, the training will blend theory and practice through a combination of lectures delivered by academics and workshops with practitioners aimed at explaining the function and functioning of specific technological solutions in the context of the due diligence process.
Scholarships available for PhD researchers and MA students
Katalyst recently joined Canopy at the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership. Canopy is a community of organisations focused on accelerating solutions to global sustainability challenges. This new home for KI’s connections in the UK compliments our base in Amsterdam, at social change incubator A-Lab. While Katalyst remains headquartered in the Netherlands, we are excited to see our international network continuing to grow in Europe and beyond.
Katalyst participated this week in the OECD Forum on Due Diligence in the Garment & Footwear sector. This annual gathering is both an opportunity to check in with colleagues in other organisations working to improve supply chains, and to get a sense of where progress is – and is not – being made towards fairer and more sustainable supply chains in the garment industry.
Katalyst joined our colleagues from Cornell’s Global Labor Institute this week for a series of presentations to civil society, policymakers and investors related to Higher Ground. Katalyst was a contributing author to this groundbreaking report that highlights heat and flood risks in the garment industry, and the need for climate adaptation.
One of the highlights was a roundtable at the European Parliament, co-hosted by MEP Saskia Bricmont and the Clean Clothes Campaign.
Katalyst spoke this week with Professor Elena Sychenko’s ESG Compliance class at the University of Bologna, discussing human rights and climate risks in supply chains, and steps that can be taken to address them.
Katalyst’s Martin Curley was a guest lecturer this week at Cornell University’s Industrial & Labor Relations (ILR) School. He joined Prof. Sarosh Kuruvilla’s class on labour practices in global supply chains & had a great discussion with students on the role of NGOs in trying to secure responsible business conduct.
Presentation Title: Supporting SDG Decent Work Targets through Context-Specific Supply Chain Governance
In this talk, we explore how our recent research points to a need to tailor new laws, collective bargaining systems and treaties to the varying power and financial flows in different industries, in order to achive decent work at scale.
See more at the Conference Website. The event is open for in-person participation at the University of Trento.
14 April 2023
Governing Today’s Garment Industry: Key Challenges and Opportunities for Policy-Makers
Katalyst is pleased to be participating in the ‘Rebalance Democracy and Capitalism‘ series of talks hosted by the University of Pisa.
In this talk, we explore how Katalyst’s research into some critical but poorly-documented aspects of the garment industry’s structure can help policymakers design better legislation, treaties, and forms of collective bargaining designed for 21st century supply chains.
Watch the recording here
14 February 2023 • 16:00-17:15 CET
HIGHER GROUND + TRADE REALITIES
Official Side Session • 2023 OECD Forum on Due Diligence in the Garment and Footwear Sector
This official online side session to the OECD Forum 2023 brings together the lessons of two new research studies:
Trade Realities is Katalyst Initiative’s new study detailing how trade flows are likely to impact the effectiveness of supply chain governance efforts like HRDD, now and into the future.
Cornell University Global Labour Institute’s forthcoming Higher Ground paper – which Katalyst contributed to – presents original projections of impacts for workers, suppliers and national economies of climate breakdown in four case study production zones in Asia.
Taken together, these studies help to embed discussions of HRDD for a just transition in the realities of possible outcomes for workers, factories, and national economies in light of climate change, particularly extreme heat and flooding. The session will:
• Help to build a foundation for the economic, policy and behavioural changes that will be needed in the coming years.
• Examine the possible impacts and possible limitations of mandatory HRDD strategies being developed in consumer economies such as the EU or US.
• Consider what modifications need to be made to these strategies in order to achieve the goal of a Just Transition for today’s garment workers, and for tomorrow’s.
15-16 September 2022
Enforceable Brand Agreements: What role in the Future of Transnational Governance and In Ongoing Labour Campaigns?
St. Gallen University
Institute for Business Ethics
Competence Center for African Research
Katalyst joined an international mix of researchers and practitioners to explore the possibilities of Enforceable Brand Agreements in helping to fill governance gaps in global supply chains.
Download the conference brochure here.
9 July 2022
Katalyst speaking at Living Wage is Possible Conference, Zagreb
Katalyst was pleased to be invited to speak at the Clean Clothes Campaign and Novi Sindikat conference Living Wage is Possible in Zagreb.
In addition to participating on the panel “What does due diligence have to do with wages, transparency, gender, and purchasing practices?” Katalyst had a chance to catch up with staff from many trade unions and civil society organisations, and to help identify areas where future research can help answer outstanding questions.
