The Mekong Club
Matthew Friedman is an accomplished professional with extensive experience in human trafficking prevention and public health management. Currently serving as the Chief Executive Officer of The Mekong Club since December 2012, Friedman has played a pivotal role in combating human slavery through collaboration with senior executives across various industries. Previous roles include Technical Advisor for multiple counter-trafficking organizations, Regional Project Manager for the UN International Project on Human Trafficking, and Deputy Director at USAID, where responsibilities spanned across Asia with management of significant budgets and projects related to public health and trafficking. Friedman’s educational background includes a Master's degree in Health Education from New York University and a Bachelor's degree in Biology and Psychology from Central Connecticut State University. Additionally, Friedman is an award-winning inspirational keynote speaker, delivering impactful speeches for over 30 years.
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The Mekong Club
The Mekong Club is a catalyst for change, uniting and mobilizing businesses to bring about sustainable practices towards the fight against modern slavery. Given that the majority of modern-day slavery exists in the private sector, these companies are ideally placed to help turn the tide of this global epidemic. The only organisation of its kind, The Mekong Club steers away from the approach taken by other players in this space, which is to ‘name and shame’ companies – ousting bad behaviour or issues related to this subject. Instead, we believe in starting and ending with collaboration. In fact, The Mekong Club originally formed as a direct response to the growing number of companies looking to develop strategies to address forced labour risk through a professional forum. Divided into industry-specific working groups, these networks meet regularly to learn, share best practices, and network with other like-minded professionals. Member companies also work together to achieve an annual deliverable which will work towards producing tangible results in the fight against forced labour. We have identified four industries within the private sector that we believe have the greatest opportunity to impact change. They are: financial services, apparel & footwear, hospitality providers and retailers. LinkedIn disclaimer: The Mekong Club reserves the right to remove comments that are not on topic, abusive or use bad language.