"Aviva-backed benchmark ranks companies on human rights", 13 Mar 2017

Costco, the US retail group, and the copper miner Grupo Mexico have been named the worst laggards on human rights standards in a new ranking from Aviva Investors of firms on their respect for humanitarian ideals.  The 2017 Corporate Human Rights Benchmark assessed 98 publicly-traded companies in the "high-risk" agricultural products, apparel and extractives industries. Aviva is one of the leaders of the project, and says it has support from investors with $5.3 trillion under management.  It assessed the firms on their policies, governance, processes, practices, and transparency, as well as how the firms respond to serious allegations of human rights abuse - and compiled this into a score out of 100%...The human rights report found most companies in these three "high-risk" industries scored poorly on human rights, with only a small cluster near the top - led by miners BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto, and the UK retailer Marks & Spencer.