Responsible and Sustainable International Business Conduct

Reporting
- Companies must publish a policy document with a commitment to uphold due diligence obligations in their value chain and including a due diligence plan as part of the regular business process
- Annual reports on due diligence and policy measures and the results of any measures taken. Includes a disclosure of data unless it is confidential for competitive or safety reasons
Due Diligence
- Follows the six steps of due diligence in OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises
- Companies must prioritize tackling all potential and actual negative impacts based on their severity and likelihood.
- Companies must ensure a well-function remediation mechanism (grievance mechanism) for stakeholders to file complaints to the enterprise with the possibility of submitting disputes to a dispute resolution committee or court of law
- In case of causing and contributing to negative impacts, enterprises must offer remediation and terminate their involvement in a negative impact, if needed by terminating business relationships
Other
- Duty of Care: where enterprises know or reasonably suspect its activities may negatively impact human rights, labor rights or the environment in countries outside the Netherlands they must take preventive measures, mitigate, or reverse them, enable remediation and refrain from such activities

Human Rights
- Broadly defined including labor rights, restriction of freedom of association and collective bargaining, discrimination, forced labor. child labor, unsafe working conditions, slavery, exploitation
Environment
- Covers environmental damage broadly defined

Own Operations
Subsidiaries
Direct Suppliers
Indirect Suppliers
- Refers to both production lines and business relationships, yet it is uncertain whether this includes indirect suppliers
Full Value Chain

Large Companies
- Applies to enterprises meeting two of the three following criteria: 1) balance sheet of 20 million euros total, 2) net revenue of 40 million euros, and 3) average number of 250 employees during the financial year
- Applies to enterprises registered in the Netherlands including in Bonaire, Sint Eustatious and Saba
- Applies to foreign enterprises meeting the company scope requirements and engaging in activities in the Netherlands or that market products in the Dutch market
SMEs
- General duty of care for all companies operating in the Netherlands, but no due diligence obligations

Monitoring
- Public regulator with 10 FTE staff has the power to
  investigate failures and act on complaints filed by
  stakeholders
- Public regulator shall supervise compliance with the law including enforcement and education
Administrative Sanctions
- In case of breach, the public regulator may issue administrative penalties starting with binding instruction to comply with the law within a time limit.
- Financial sanctions can be imposed by the public regulator (maximum fine of the fourth or fifth category of Article 23(4) of the Dutch Criminal Code depending on which articles of the law have been breached)
- Penalties are published

Civil Liability
- Third parties can hold companies liable in civil courts for any harms resulting from a violation of due diligence obligations and claim damages
- No presumption of liability or reversal of the burden of proof
Facilitating Access to Justice
- Likely access to court through existing Dutch tort law for the general duty of care
Other
- Criminal liability for company directors: Repeated failure within five years to halt activities that cause or contribute to negative human rights and environmental impacts (due diligence obligations) or to provide remedy shall be considered a criminal offense and sanctioned through fines and jail time