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Modern Slavery and Human Trafficking Statement April 2021 – March 2022

Modern slavery is a crime and a violation of fundamental human rights. It takes various forms, such as slavery, servitude, forced and compulsory labour and human trafficking, all of which have in common the deprivation of a person’s liberty by another in order to exploit them for personal or commercial gain. VIDAfresh is committed and determined to do all that we can to combat slavery and human trafficking.

This statement is made pursuant to section 54(1) of the Modern Slavery Act 2015 and constitutes our slavery and human trafficking statement.

VIDAfresh is an industry specialists in melons, pineapples and citrus. We also supply a wide range of fruits, vegetables and salad products to our diverse customer base. Our efficient team of 31 source produce from over around the world which helped us last year to reach a global annual turnover of over £56m.

VIDAfresh recognises the serious global issue regarding human trafficking and within this statement declares that it will not tolerate any element of modern slavery within our operations. We have systems in place to assess and report potential victims of modern slavery and the protection of whistle-blowers. VIDAfresh are members of SEDEX, Stronger Together and Sainsbury’s RightLine initiative to help drive improvements and identify potential threats in all ethical aspects of our business.

We are committed to ensuring that there is no modern slavery or human trafficking in our supply chains or in any part of our business. Due to our obligation to report on measures and ensure that all parts of our business and supply chain are slavery free we have put in place a designated Modern Slavery and Human Trafficking Policy.

Our Modern Slavery and Human Trafficking Policy demonstrates our commitment to acting ethically and with integrity in all our business relationships and to implementing and enforcing effective systems and controls to ensure slavery and human trafficking is not taking place anywhere in our supply chains.

We have a zero tolerance to slavery and human trafficking. To ensure all those in our supply chain and contractors comply with our values we have in place a supply chain compliance programme. VIDAfresh’s supplier compliance programme consists of a variety of systems and processes that reduce risk and highlight any ethical non-compliances within our supplier base. This is achieved and monitored with third-party audits and site visits together with independent ethical assurance schemes.

VIDAfresh supplier compliance team consists of involvement from the following departments:

• Commercial
• Technical

The compliance team is led by VIDAfresh’s Technical Manager.

To ensure a high level of understanding of the risks of modern slavery and human trafficking in our supply chains and our business, Stronger Together provides training to our staff on how to identify, monitor and report any suspected victims. Due to the nature of our industry the use of temporary workers is unavoidable which therefore comes with an element of risk of forced labour. Consequently, we also strongly encourage our business partners to provide the same training to their staff and suppliers and providers. To ensure we have minimised the risk to any potential workers, staff are provided training in their native language of how to report any potential threats.

VIDAfresh recognise the importance and severity of tackling all ethical challenges presented to the company and are fully committed to the reduction and elimination of modern slavery to ensure that slavery and human trafficking is not taking place in any part of our business or supply chain. This is achieved by ensuring that all of our suppliers are members of ethical assurance schemes such as SEDEX and/or Stronger Together as well as completing ‘Supplier Approval’ audits in conjunction with stringent face-to-face customer audits as well as on-site inspections through an authorised, independent third-party company.

Terry Watts

VIDAfresh CEO

 

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VIDAfresh team members

You can contact our team members directly via email, telephone and Skype.

Directors

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Technical Team

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Commercial Team

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