What is the Fifty Eight Project?
Fifty Eight is all about doing good work for people everywhere. It’s a partnership-driven initiative that brings together business, academia, government, and civil society to tackle exploitation in supply chains. The goal? To raise the bar for working conditions globally. By combining innovative research, actionable data, and smart tech solutions, Fifty Eight addresses worker exploitation and harmful child labour. It connects insights from grassroots communities right up to boardrooms, creating a full picture of the challenges and opportunities in supply chains.
Main Benefits and Key Facts
Here’s a quick snapshot of what Fifty Eight brings to the table:
- Workers using the Just Good Work app.
- Countries where the project operates: 1 (but growing!)
- Company, NGO, and Academic partners involved: 0 (yet, but watch this space)
- Among 10,000+ B Corps worldwide, Fifty Eight ranks in the top 100 — that’s 100% commitment to impact.
Innovative Solutions to Modern Challenges
Fifty Eight offers technological tools designed to help organisations monitor and tackle modern slavery, child labour, and other human rights issues. These solutions aren’t just theoretical—they’re practical and interactive. For example, the Just Good Work platform is a mobile app that empowers individuals to make better choices when working abroad. It boosts transparency throughout the recruitment and employment journey, focusing on migrant workers, responsible recruitment, and safe migration.
Gathering Data That Matters
Another key tool is MEL, which helps organisations collect grassroots data to analyse how effective their human rights programmes really are. This means better understanding the impact and efficiency of efforts to combat child labour, human trafficking, modern slavery, and broader human rights challenges. It’s about turning raw data into real-world change.
Research at the Core
Research isn’t just a side project for Fifty Eight—it’s the heartbeat of everything they do. Rigorous, evidence-based research drives measurable impact and supports all the solutions and innovations developed with partners and clients. This approach ensures that every step taken is backed by solid insights and real-world evidence.
Fifty Eight’s Impact on Sustainable Development Goals
- SDG 8: Decent Work and Economic Growth
- SDG 10: Reduced Inequalities
- SDG 16: Peace, Justice, and Strong Institutions
- SDG 17: Partnerships for the Goals
The Journey and Global Reach
The story of Fifty Eight began with Quintin and Angela Lake, who met on a factory floor back in 2003. Inspired by an article on Modern Slavery, their idea took shape during a trip around Asia in 2011. They saw firsthand how good business models can uplift communities and improve lives—from customers to staff to supply chains. Launching Fifty Eight in Liverpool in 2014, they’ve since grown steadily, with milestones like research on corporate responses to modern slavery, joining the PACE consortium to fight child labour, and launching the Just Good Work app for migrant workers in Kenya, Qatar, the UK, and Malaysia. Today, Fifty Eight operates across Africa, Europe, Asia, the Middle East, the Americas, and the Pacific, partnering with major supermarkets and other organisations to support worker rights worldwide.
