A responsible procurement policy involves two complementary components: a product component and a supplier component.
While the supplier approach aims to ensure that an organization makes its purchases from responsible suppliers, the product approach is focused on selecting responsible goods and services (i.e. goods and services whose social and environmental impacts are minimized throughout their life cycles). The two approaches are complementary. By choosing sustainable products, an organization incites suppliers to improve their practices. The product approach is therefore a component of the supplier approach, since it is a simple and direct lever to promote social responsibility in the supply chain.
More specifically, the supplier approach involves:
- Fostering the selection of suppliers whose practices are responsible by taking sustainable principles and issues into account in the selection process
- Supporting suppliers that work to enhance their practices by integrating sustainable development principles and issues into analysis, assessment, development and supplier relations management tools
The implementation of the supplier approach includes four mechanisms that may be implemented concurrently or separately.
