Human Rights Policy

Ak-taş Dış Ticaret A.Ş. adopts a respectful attitude to human rights for its employees and all stakeholders with whom it has dealings in its business fields, informs all stakeholders accordingly, and aims to uphold fundamental human rights by collaborating with suppliers that comply with the human rights policy through its purchasing and supplier selection processes.

In order to underline the importance and respect attributed to its employees and community, Aktaş undertakes to implement the following principles by means of its human rights policy.

Prevention of Child Labor: The Company shall not engage or support use of child labor and young workers and shall not employ workers younger than 18 years of age.

Prevention of Forced or Compulsory Labor: The Company shall not engage in or support use of forced or compulsory labor in that it shall employ all workers voluntarily and ensure that overtime shall be voluntary.

It shall not engage in or support human trafficking in any manner.

Promotion of Occupational Health and Safety Requirements: The Company shall uphold full compliance with international principles and national laws and regulations concerning occupational health and safety and perform good practices surpassing legal obligations.

It shall create a working environment meeting the conditions to ensure that all employees can work safely and with satisfaction.

It shall take necessary measures to prevent occupational accidents and diseases, offer regular training about occupational health and safety practices, involve its employees in the process, and create healthy and safe working conditions by giving priority to the general health condition of employees.

Non-Discrimination: It shall not discriminate or support discrimination against its employees based on race, skin color, nationality, national – regional – ethnic origins, social status, faith, disability, gender, sexual orientation, marital status, political and philosophical opinions, sect, age, military service status, pregnancy, membership to associations or any other condition that may lead to discrimination with respect to hiring, termination, retirement, promotion, remuneration processes, access to training opportunities or disciplinary procedures and it shall take the professional skills of employees into account for all such processes.

Disciplinary Practices and Prevention of Abuse/Harassment: All employees shall be treated respectfully and with due regard for human dignity in our company’s locations. The Company shall not tolerate or support the exertion of physical punishment, mental punishment, physical contact, and violence, or verbal abuse on the employees.

Abusive treatment or inhuman treatment shall not be tolerated.

Right to Collective Bargaining and Freedom of Association: It shall respect the employees’ right to collective bargaining and freedom of association.

Wages and Payment: It shall respect the employees’ right to minimum wage which is determined as part of the applicable laws and pay the wages including overtime fees regularly and in a timely manner.

Working Hours: It shall determine working hours with due regard for the applicable laws and obligations and ensure that overtime hours are compatible with the legal durations.

Ethical Business Conduct: It shall uphold the corporate code of conduct and shall not tolerate corruption, fraud, and bribery in any manner.

Relationships with Suppliers: It shall monitor and assess the above-mentioned social compliance activities conducted by its suppliers.

It shall perform, maintain, and consistently improve its social compliance, occupational health and safety, and environmental management activities under a management system that conforms to the applicable laws and regulations, the International Labor Organization (ILO) conventions, the UN (United Nations) Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights and the current Management System Standards.

This policy is issued on 26.04.2024 upon the approval of the Member of the Board of Directors. It shall be regularly reviewed every year and updated whenever any revision is deemed necessary. The latest versions of our policies are e-mailed to all employees and published on our corporate website for the relevant stakeholders.