In order to meet our customers’ expectations for high-quality, innovative products, we rely on service and manufacturing partners from around the world. Together, we continue to drive responsible and ethical behavior and high standards across our supply chain.
Setting clear standards for our suppliers
The key to a high standard supply chain is ensuring that our suppliers know our expectations, including those in the field of sustainability. We adhere to three important sustainability standards: the Barco Code of Conduct of Suppliers, the Product Compliance Requirements and the Responsible Minerals Sourcing Policy.
1. Barco code of conduct for suppliers
We require all our suppliers to comply with the Barco Code of Conduct for Suppliers, which is fully aligned with the RBA Code of Conduct (Responsible Business Alliance). The RBA Code of Conduct is a set of standards covering social, environmental and ethical topics relevant to the electronics industry supply chain. The Code is aligned with international norms and standards including the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, ILO International Labor Standards, OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises, ISO and SA standards. Topics covered include:
- Labor and human rights: freely chosen employment, humane treatment, non-discrimination, freedom of association, ...
- Health and safety: emergency preparedness, machine safeguarding, ...
- Environment: air emissions, hazardous substances, environmental permits and reporting, ...
- Ethics: business integrity, fair business, advertising and competition, responsible sourcing of minerals, privacy, …
2. Barco product compliance requirements
Every component that our suppliers deliver to Barco must comply with the Barco Product Compliance Requirements, which includes compliance with worldwide regulations, industry standards and additional criteria that we have defined. Barco also requires compliance with the Barco substance list, in which we restrict the use of specific chemicals or require declaration of specific substances. With the implementation of the Barco substance list, we go beyond current legislation.
Data collection: since 2010, Barco’s Environmental Compliance Office collects substance information from all Barco suppliers for all products. This data collection is performed in collaboration with the company Greensoft Technology which provides a tool (Green Data Manager) where environmental data can be stored, maintained and reported. We strongly urge suppliers to provide full material discloures (FMDs) of their supplied components so that we can guarantee future compliance of our products with regulations worldwide. It also avoids efforts in updating suppliers’ certificates and helps us in improving our ecodesign processes by allowing choosing materials that are less harmful to the environment. Our experts in the Environmental Compliance Office perform risk-based assessments of compliance data provided by suppliers and request in-depth compliance data for high-risk parts. Barco is part of the BOMcheck.net project, a web-based industry platform for exchanging chemical information with the aim of ensuring compliance with RoHS, REACH and other global industry standards.
For more information please contact our Environmental Compliance Office at green.compliance@barco.com.
3. Barco responsible minerals sourcing policy
Managing our obligations in the field of conflict minerals is part of Barco’s corporate responsibility. We and many of our stakeholders are concerned about human rights violations in different forms (child labor, human trafficking, forced labor etc.) as well as armed conflicts causing extreme violence across so-called “conflict-affected and high-risk areas”. We recognize the risk related to illegal extraction and trade of materials such as tin, tungsten, tantalum, gold and cobalt.
Read the Barco responsible minerals sourcing policy here.
Download here the different resources for suppliers
Embedding sustainability in the procurement process
In order to ensure the level of engagement required, we integrate sustainability into every step of the procurement process.
1. Supplier scouting
When scouting new suppliers, we require them to complete the supplier self-assessment document. This document includes sustainability-related questions which form the basis for open discussions when a gap between supplier behavior and our expectations is detected at first glance.
2. Supplier onboarding
Before a new supplier is onboarded, a new supplier selection report is prepared by the procurement delegate, in which a set of mandatory criteria (including sustainability) are confirmed.
3. Purchase contracts
Sustainability clauses are part of Barco’s terms and conditions (T&Cs) for purchase as well as our master supply agreements (MSAs) (i.e. contracts with key and core suppliers).
4. Supplier performance monitoring
Once a supplier has been welcomed into the Barco supply chain, we continually work with them to deliver excellent performance. We score suppliers against seven core performance pillars to underpin our goal of supplier performance excellence. One of these pillars in sustainability. The sustainability score is communicated to suppliers during business review meetings. Dedicated improvement actions are agreed upon and tracked by the procurement delegate.
During these meetings, sustainability is a fixed topic of the agenda: we share our sustainability ambitions and highlight how important it is for our suppliers to help us achieve our targets. Suppliers are encouraged to proactively share their progress regarding sustainability in their operations and supply chains, and to share innovations that could help us improve the sustainability impact of our products.
5. Training
We also want to ensure that our suppliers understand our sustainability standards and learn how to act upon them. Through different communication channels, we train suppliers and inform them about developments in several sustainability domains, such as labor practices and human rights, environmental compliance and conflict minerals.
As part of our training program, we provide the Barco Environmental Requirements guidance for suppliers.
