Guías Colombia is a widely known multi-stakeholder initiative in Colombia, focused on improving the overall human rights situation in the country through the promotion of responsible business conduct. This voluntary initiative currently comprises 24 members of different origin: companies, business associations, civil society organizations, international organizations, and State institutions. Fundación Ideas para la Paz – FIP is both a founding member and exercises the technical secretariat of the initiative.

For nearly 13 years, Guías Colombia has promoted corporate human rights due diligence through the joint elaboration of guides focused on essential topics for companies and rights’ holders. These guides have been designed collaboratively within the initiative, using the main international standards as reference -like the United Nations’ Guiding Principles- as well as global best practice. The guides also take into consideration the complexities faced by companies when operating in contexts like Colombia; for instance, situations of violence and State weakness.

As Guías Colombia we believe these guides are useful for companies elsewhere that are in need of orientation to begin their journey to ensure the respect for human rights. They have been written in a practical format easily applicable by companies, using the Plan–Do–Check–Act cycle. This is why this effort to translate our guides to English aims to expand our reach to an international audience and to a variety of stakeholders in a global context.

Until now, Guías Colombia has published six (6) guides –and an annex to one of them-, all of which have been translated to English. These guides are open for public consultation and use without any cost. Each of the guides addresses one of the following topics:

1. Decent Work, and an annex of good practices
2. Institutional Strengthening
3. Purchase and Acquisition of Land Rights and Rights of Use
4. Security
5. Operational-level Grievance Mechanisms
6. Supply Chain Management

Guías Colombia is currently working on a new guide on the issue of human rights due diligence in community engagement.

We hope these guides are useful to companies, civil society organizations, and States committed to promoting and improving the respect of human rights and international humanitarian law in the framework of business activities in Colombia and worldwide.