Greek Business & Children’s Rights
Benchmark Assessment
- Ελληνικά
- English
Highlights
This report presents the first publicly available assessment of how Greek companies integrate children’s rights into their operations, using a mixed-methods approach that combines quantitative surveys and qualitative focus groups. Two focus groups with managers and one with youth representatives provided in-depth insights into perceptions and practices, while surveys of company employees and young people captured broader trends. This triangulation of data ensures a better and richer understanding of both corporate self-assessment and external stakeholder views.
Key Insights
Greek companies show a strong stated commitment to children’s rights, but fall short in implementation. Most executives equate children’s rights with the absence of child labour, overlooking broader issues such as family support, marketing ethics, and environmental responsibility. Larger companies and companies with child-relevant products outperform SMEs, which dominate the Greek business ecosystem but lack resources and guidance. Across governance, workplace, supply chain, environment, and restitution, gaps exist — especially in employee training, supplier audits, grievance mechanisms, and environmental risk assessment. Youth voices are the most critical, expressing distrust and calling out tokenistic CSR. Perceptions of other companies (meta-perceptions) suggest that only one-third are seen as performing positively, reinforcing the need for systemic change.
Recommendations
To close the commitment–implementation gap, the assessment calls for:
• Explicitly and systematically embed children’s rights into ESG frameworks and governance structures.
• Championing family-friendly workplaces.
• Strengthening supply chain due diligence and introducing transparent grievance mechanisms.
• Engaging youth voices in stakeholder dialogue processes and improving disclosure under EU sustainability standards.
By bolstering strong collaboration among companies, business associations, multi-stakeholder platforms, government bodies, and expert child rights organizations, the Children’s Rights and Business Principles (CRBP) framework along with proven best practices, can be actively championed and translated into tangible actions—delivering measurable and lasting improvements for children’s lives.
For enquiries and information
Please contact:
Marina Drymalitou, Partnerships Officer, [email protected]
