13th United Nations Forum on Business and Human Rights

Adrian Pereira is the Executive Director and co-founder of North-South Initiative (NSI), a Human Rights and Social Justice orientated organisation based in Malaysia. NSI’s mission is to build a society that prioritises social justice via solidarity building. At NSI, the social mobilisers team works with marginalized communities from the ASEAN region and beyond to create a competent and resilient movement using critical pedagogy and design thinking. Before setting up NSI, Adrian has worked with 2 UN-accredited international organizations, Pax Romana International Movement of Catholic Students (IMCS) and Dignity International. Adrian has also been involved in the ASEAN Forum of Migrant Labour (AMFL) since 2012. AFML is the official arm of ASEAN which deliberates on labour migration policy. Adrian Pereira is also an Adjunct Professor with the School of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Faculty of Social Sciences & Leisure Management, Taylor’s University (Malaysia). He is also an External Panel Member of the University Ethics Committee (Human) under the Research Management Centre of Management and Science University (Malaysia). He is also a board member of CARAM Asia and an alumnus of the Diplomacy Training Program(DTP) of the University of New South Wales, Law Faculty. He is also an alumnus of the prestigious International Visitor Leadership Program (IVLP) of the U.S. Department of State.

The communities NSI works with include migrant workers, refugees, domestic workers, victims of forced labour, small scale farmers, indigenous youths and people living in conflict zones like Patani and West Papua. This includes cleaning up the global supply chain from forced labour and ensuring Businesses and Governments come up with solutions for human rights violations, including promoting gender justice. Adrian believes Malaysia has become the “breeding ground” for forced labour in the global supply chain but has the potential to be a role model for remedies if there is political will and a clear corporate vision from the Business sector to right the wrongs. Some of the current tools and methods used by NSI to engage the Business sector includes helpline systems, smart phone applications, remediation, social audits, workers empowerment, middle management training, data collection and evidence driven digital systems.


Even though NSI is a small & lean entity, we have developed competent migrant and refugee leaders who can document evidence of human rights and labour violations. We also have coached our interns and volunteers over the years who now contribute via various CSOs. To be sustainable, we have also established formal working relationships with multiple universities, INGOs, Trade Unions, Supply Chains, and Intergovernmental Organizations to produce critical analysis and policy interventions despite having limited resources.


Adrian Pereira can be contacted at +60122900756/pereira@nsinitiative.net https://linktr.ee/northsouthinitiative (NSI Comms)
https://nsinitiative.net/2492-2/ (Adrian Comms)