Nike shareholders have voted against a proposal to consider a worker-driven model and binding worker rights agreements to improve its ability to address human rights issues.

Nike’s supply chain management has come into sharp focus as a result of numerous allegations of forced labor and wage theft-related concerns in factories manufacturing its products. Last year more than 60 investors signed a letter urging Nike to pay $2.2 million in allegedly unpaid wages to some 4,000 garment workers in Cambodia and Thailand.

Nike sources from five factories in Pakistan, according to its own supply chain disclosures, yet it is not a signatory to the Pakistan Accord, a binding health and safety agreement between workers’ unions and brands that peers including Adidas and Puma have signed.

The resolution at yesterday’s shareholder meeting had been proposed by a group of investors, including Domini Impact Equity Fund, which says current approaches in the industry “often fail to identify and remedy persistent rights abuses such as wage theft, inadequate health and safety or gender-based violence”. The resolution was also supported by Norway’s Sovereign Wealth Fund.

Nike’s board had recommended that shareholders vote against the proposal, claiming it has now established robust controls to identify and address labor issues throughout its supply chain.

“The company has established robust processes and practices to help identify, assess, and remediate human rights and labour issues throughout its operations and supply chain,” the board of directors stated.

Scepticism as to the accuracy of this statement abounds – 26 separate audits in a Nike factory in Vietnam failed to pick up any violations while a single worker-centered investigation revealed gross rights violations and extensive wage theft . Nike took years to address the situation. The company also continues to deny that it owes $2.2 million in unpaid, legally owed wages to the workers in Cambodia and and Thailand. However, despite the human rights concerns and the backing of the resolution by high profile investors, the shareholders ultimately decided to vote against it.