And as if that were not enough, not only should it cover the operations that the company directly controls, but those of its value chain should also be considered, since that is where the greatest risks, the most severe impacts or the best opportunities in terms of social responsibility.
How many companies have not faced serious reputational and even financial crises due to labor rights scandals, environmental issues or controversial situations that arose in some link of their value chain?
Given this, a challenge is presented for those companies that take their corporate sustainability seriously, since this will imply not only mapping their value chain (suppliers, distributors, dealers, business partners, etc.), but also carrying out processes of diagnosis or due diligence to be able to identify said risks, impacts and opportunities that could arise in the value chain, and from there act accordingly with various scopes.
Some companies decide to start by simply sharing a decalogue of principles or code of ethics with their value chain, or ask them to answer a simple questionnaire about their social, environmental and governance practices. From there, it could be possible to advance to the signing of some commitment or the inclusion of a clause in this regard within the corresponding contract, until arriving at evaluation, monitoring or auditing schemes in the matter, to ensure that they effectively comply with what was requested, or that for what they claim to do, have sufficient evidence to support it.
When the results of any member of its value chain are positive or a good score or level is achieved in terms of sustainability, it may be that the commercial relationship with the company is maintained or expanded; but on the contrary, with negative results or low scores, it could imply that certain conditions are established to continue with the commercial relationship, or even in some other cases, that it is limited or terminated.
Additionally, there are also companies that decide to support their value chain to advance jointly on these issues, being able to offer them some talks or formal training, as well as supplier development schemes, advice, support and even economic support or financing linked to their progress or commitments to sustainability, especially when within the value chain there are micro, small or medium-sized companies, for which all these aids can be the difference to trigger or promote their progress in terms of sustainability.