A/HRC/42/41 economy, bearing in mind that those working in the informal sector are usually not captured in statistics on the impacts of hazardous substances on workers. 34. States must eliminate the worst forms of child labour, which include circumstances where children use or are otherwise exposed to toxic substances at work. States must also integrate gender-specific approaches to prevention of workers’ exposure to toxic substances. Safeguarding reproductive health from hazardous working conditions is a core obligation of States in the elimination of discrimination against women in employment. Women workers have a right to special protection during all periods that pose reproductive risks to them 31 as well as to their offspring, which requires protection from work that exposes them or their fetus to toxic chemicals. At the same time, women should not be deprived of equal opportunities for employment or income. Women workers may also be exposed to toxic substances at work before and during the earliest stages of pregnancy, or even before they may know they are pregnant. This reality requires special care on the part of States and businesses to protect women’s reproductive health by preventing their exposure to toxic substances without limiting employment in a discriminatory fashion. The best means of doing so is by eliminating toxic substances at work and applying appropriate standards of protections to all workers. 32 Principle 3 – Business enterprises have a responsibility to prevent occupational exposures to toxic substances. Commentary 35. In today’s world virtually every sector of the economy is implicated in the ongoing abuse of the right to safe and healthy work, including the world’s most economically powerful and technologically advanced industries. Many of these industries and sectors have – by their own design – vast and opaque supply chains, including links to the informal economy. Some of these business enterprises are not obviously implicated, for example, financial institutions that trade gold extracted by informal workers using mercury, resulting in severe health impacts, particularly for women workers and their children. 36. These enterprises include employers, purchasers of products and suppliers of toxic substances, among others. In the case of occupational exposures, the impacts that business enterprises are responsible for include exposure to toxic substances and adverse health outcomes. The responsibilities of businesses regarding safe and healthy working conditions require the continuous improvement of working conditions and extend to their business relationships, both at home and abroad, and their products’ life cycles.33 37. Business enterprises can develop and adopt alternatives that reduce harm to human health and the environmental impact of their operations and business relationships. Some have already done so. However, many enterprises have not, including many that have outsourced and/or buried the problem of toxic exposure further down their global supply chains. This has enabled them to continue “business as usual” instead of adopting measures to respect workers’ rights affected by toxic work, despite increasing expectations that business enterprises should prevent exposure to toxics as part of their human rights due diligence. 38. Business enterprises have a responsibility to prevent occupational exposures to toxic substances as part of the due diligence expected of them, to “prevent [and] mitigate” impacts on human rights.34 Prevention of human rights abuse is principal and a prelude to mitigation in due diligence procedures.35 To prevent adverse impacts on workers’ rights, 31 32 33 34 35 Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, art. 11 (2) (d). A/33/41, paras. 32–33. See, for example, Global Sustainability Standards Board, Global Reporting Initiative, GRI 403: Occupational Health and Safety 2018. For definitions of business relationships and the value chain, see Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, The Corporate Responsibility to Respect Human Rights: An Interpretive Guide (2012). Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, principle 15. Ibid. 9