The aim of the Fair Wear Foundation (FWF) is to promote legal and humane labour conditions in the worldwide garment industry, particularly in countries where garments are produced for the Dutch market. The FWF believes that labour conditions should at least comply with the relevant minimum standards set by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) and with local laws and regulations. Where there are differences or conflicts between the ILO standards and local law, the higher standard should prevail. For the FWF the most important tool used to pursue this aim is a code of conduct for garment companies, called the Fair Wear Foundation Code of Labour Practices (discussed in detail in chapter 6). Garment companies in the Netherlands can become "Members of the Fair Wear Foundation" if they endorse this code and accept verification of code compliance by the Fair Wear Foundation.
The principles of the FWF Code of Labour Practices, which are further elaborated in the third
chapter, are:
• supply chain responsibility,
• labour standards derived from widely-accepted ILO Conventions and the UN’s Universal Declaration on Human Rights,
• a “process approach” to implementation,
• involvement of local stakeholders in auditing and corrective action, and
• independent verification, also known as external verification, of code implementation.