Mainstreaming Responsible Sourcing
Across industries, companies are facing similar issues when it comes to responsible sourcing, such as compliance with anti-competition law, transparency, and traceability. Now it is time to pool together knowledge and resources to mainstream responsible sourcing. How? With the European Pact for Sustainable Industry. Engage now!
As highlighted by the COVID-19 crisis, responsible sourcing is essential to the resilience of companies and to society’s well-being. While there are many initiatives supporting the adoption of responsible sourcing approaches, the lack of sector and cross-sector collaboration is hindering their chances for large-scale impact. This is common conclusion reached by more than fifty representatives of governmental institutions and sector initiatives that joined our webinar on “Sectorial Approaches to Responsible Sourcing”. The event, organized in collaboration with AIM–Progress, brought to the table the experience of Together for Sustainability (TfS), the Sustainable Agriculture Initiative (SAI) Platform, the Sustainable Procurement Pledge, the Consumer Goods Forum, Copper Mark and Responsible Trucking.
In different ways, all these initiatives are facing the same issues when it comes to tackling responsible sourcing:
Staying compliant with anti-competition law
The organisation and effectiveness of due diligence approaches
Creating transparency and traceability
Working with the suppliers on improvement
Funding mechanisms to create practical and impactful change at scale
In other words, there is great untapped potential for collaboration but how can companies and industry federations tap into it? For CSR Europe the answer lies in the European Pact for Sustainable Industry.
Under the umbrella of the Pact, companies, together with their industry federations, can engage in sector and cross-sector collaboration to scale-up responsible sourcing. How? By engaging the entire value-chain, balancing economy, natural resources and societal needs to maximize value creation for society at large. Building on the collective experience of their value-chain peers, competitors, customers, and experienced stakeholders, companies and industry federations will be able to scale-up methodologies to ensure responsible sourcing at industry level.
At the same time, companies and industry federations that engage in the Pact will be able to play an active role in shaping the dialogue on policy initiatives, such as the EU Green Deal and Industrial Strategy, to reach the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and especially: “Good Health and Well-Being” (SDG 3); “Decent Work and Economic Growth” (SDG 8); “Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure (SDG 9); “Sustainable Cities and Communities” (SGD 11); “Responsible Consumption and Production” (SDG 12); “Life Below Water (SDG 14); and “Life on Land” (SDG 15).
Companies and industry federations who join the Pact will have the opportunity to benefit from the consolidated experience of our community of practice on “Beyond Due Diligence”.