Companies collaborate with other stakeholders to address key social and environmental issues related to their businesses at the sectoral, landscape, and jurisdictional levels. Companies use their influence in an ethical and transparent manner to help protect the environment and respect human rights.
This Principle applies to all companies. The relevance of and company roles in each of the collaboration mechanisms described below may differ depending on the company’s position in the supply chain, its size and reach, and the degree to which activities or sourcing are concentrated in particular areas.
10.1 The company participates in or supports multi-stakeholder landscape, jurisdictional, or sectoral efforts to improve land governance, avoid deforestation and conversion, and respect human rights.
10.2 The company takes measures to support improved compliance and performance for commodities in its supply chain at the sourcing area level. This may include working individually or in collaboration with peer companies and other actors to engage suppliers and other land users that are not currently in the company’s supply chain to communicate requirements for responsible production and land use and to provide incentives and support to meet these requirements.
10.3 If the company operates in, or sources from, contexts with social or environmental risk or weak governance, it remains engaged in these settings, with a focus on using its influence to address such risks. In these situations, the company seeks opportunities to work with peers sourcing from the same area, third-party certifiers, governments, NGOs, and other stakeholders to implement collaborative efforts to strengthen governance and promote implementation of improved practices and wider compliance.
10.4 The company works with governments and other stakeholders to promote the publication of maps (eg, land-use zoning and concession areas) and other relevant information (eg, locations and trade volumes of silos or refineries) that can help accelerate implementation of sustainable practices and initiatives, facilitate monitoring, and foster transparency.
10.5 The company participates in industry and sector initiatives to create collective or aligned goals, commitments, standards, coordinated implementation processes, monitoring systems, or other measures to increase effectiveness, expand scale, and minimise leakage related to ethical supply chains.
10.6 Company-supported advocacy and governmental engagement at all levels is consistent with the company’s commitments, applicable law, and elements of the Accountability Framework. This includes advocacy related to human rights, land designations, regulations and licenses affecting commodity production and trade, and land and labour laws. The company publicly discloses all political contributions and campaign expenditures at all jurisdictional levels.
Additional detail related to Core Principle 10 is available in the following Operational Guidance: