Supply Chain Responsibility

At ST, we believe that the social, environmental and ethical aspects of suppliers’ and subcontractors’ performance are key contributors to sustainable business success. The notion of supply chain responsibility is embedded in our policies through our own Code of Conduct as well as our commitment to the industry standard (RBA, formerly EICC) code of conduct. For more than a decade, we have monitored supplier performance through regular assessments and audits in order to continually enhance our management of risks in our supply chain.

77% of suppliers commit to our CSR standards

413 assessments conducted in 2017

89% of eligible key suppliers are ISO14001 certified

ST procures materials, goods and services from thousands of sources around the world. At Corporate level, a supply chain team promotes sustainable sourcing and develops long-term relationships by choosing suppliers and subcontractors with robust social and environmental standards and practices. At local level, eligible suppliers, which are mainly service suppliers such as labor agencies, cleaning services, on-site canteen and security, are required to commit to ST's policies and we have a program in place to regularly assess and audit them based on local risks.

Our approach

We identify our risks based on category of supplier, business volume and in-region risks and adapt our level of monitoring to those risks. These criteria determine the level of due diligence we conduct from simple evaluation to independent third-party audits. We require our suppliers to commit to RBA code of conduct and our CSR standards.

Our programs mainly cover:

Social responsibility and more specifically labor and human rights (prevention of child and forced labor, control of working hours etc.)
Health and safety and environment including management of hazardous substances
Conflict minerals which we manage through the adoption and implementation of the industry-wide Responsible Minerals Initiative(RMI), formerly the Conflict Free Smelter Initiative (CFSI)
Financial risks and business continuity

Contributing to the Sustainable Development Goals

Our commitments and programs related to Labour and Human Rights contribute to:

SDG target 8.7 - Take immediate and effective measures to eradicate forced labour, end modern slavery and human trafficking and secure the prohibition and elimination of the worst forms of child labour.
SDG target 8.8 - Protect labour rights and promote safe and secure working environments for all workers.

More information can be found in our annual Sustainability Report.