【Event】Enhancing sustainability through automaker – supplier collaboration

Last week was an important milestone for enhancing sustainability in automotive supply chains. The European Automotive Working Group on Supply Chain Sustainability, consisting of ten automotive manufacturers and facilitated by CSR Europe, organized the Sustainability Automotive Supply Chain Forum in Shanghai, China, on January 20 2016.
About 200 participants, coming from automakers, suppliers, local sustainability experts, associations and academia, attended the forum. Based on the Automotive Industry Guiding Principles to Enhance Sustainability Performance in the Supply Chain, the participants engaged in open dialogue and interactive discussion on the key sustainability challenges across the automotive supply chains, the root causes of these challenges, and how both suppliers and automakers can overcome them. The topics tackled were related to environmental sustainability, business ethics, human rights and working conditions. All participants and speakers agreed that the best approach to scale up sustainability is through close collaboration between all stakeholders. Speakers included representatives from BMW Group, Jaguar Land Rover, PSA Peugeot Citroen, Scania, Volvo Cars and Volvo Group and others.
The forum was organized with the support of GoldenBee, one of the first professional organizations to embrace CSR and sustainability in China, and was the second event in a row of the local dialogue and capacity building activities series that started in November 2014 in Istanbul, Turkey.
“The Sustainability Automotive Supply Chain Forum organized in Shanghai is a first step to engage in an in-depth local dialogue between suppliers and car makers. Given the importance of the Chinese market, the European Automotive Working Group on Supply Chain Sustainability will continue its local efforts to unlock the value of enhanced long term supplier collaboration to further embed sustainability in the global value chains.” said Stefan Crets, Executive Director CSR Europe.
YU Zhihong, President and Editor-in-chief of China WTO Tribune, said “the Guiding Principle brought up by European Automotive Working Group on Supply Chain Sustainability is an automotive supply chain standard with huge potential. People continuously promote responsibility fulfilment in automotive supply chain in terms of business ethics, environment and working conditions through regular communication, which will not only yield sound results among first-tier and second-tier suppliers but also help downstream third-tier and fourth-tier suppliers form responsible supply chain awareness. In this way, a sound momentum for joint actions could be established. The cooperation and sharing mechanism is conducive to the sustainable development of the entire automotive industry.”
About the European Automotive Working Group on Supply Chain Sustainability
The Working group consists of several automotive manufacturers working together – in addition to their own efforts – to enhance sustainability in their supply chains. As of March 2014, the following 10 companies are members of the group: BMW Group, Daimler AG, Ford Motor Company, Jaguar Land Rover, PSA Peugeot Citroen, Scania, Toyota Motor Europe, Volkswagen Aktiengesellschaft, Volvo Group, Volvo Cars.
About CSR Europe
CSR Europe is Europe’s leading business network for Corporate Social Responsibility. With 59corporate members and 45 National Partner Organisations, it is a platform for supporting companies from different industrial sectors to positively contribute to society. CSR Europe facilitates the work of the Automotive Working Group. www.csreurope.org
About GoldenBee
GoldenBee is the pioneering network of CSR and sustainable development in China. It aims to:
- boost China's social responsibility development and sustainable development through consulting service, research and communication.
- achieve the coexistence, win-win result and symbiosis between business and society
- perform its mission with common vision, joint actions, cross-border cooperation and shared value.
- be a collective brand for Chinese enterprises pursuing sustainable performance.
- be the advocator, promoter, disseminator and service provider of CSR in China.
For more information, contact Catalina Pislaru at cp@csreurope.org.