Initiatives Related to Sustainable Procurement
In addition to responsible mineral sourcing, the SMM Group formulated the Sumitomo Metal Mining Group Sustainable Procurement Policy, which provides for cooperation with stakeholders to carry our procurement activities that consider human rights and labor, compliance, quality assurance, and environment and local communities with the aim of building sustainable supply chains throughout the Group.
We requested our main business partners (suppliers) to agree to this policy, and 99% have agreed. In addition, we ask those suppliers who agreed to the policy to complete a self-assessment questionnaire (SAQ) concerning sustainable procurement, and responses have been received from 98%.
The responses to the SAQ reveal that about 85% of overall evaluations were accounted for by the highest of the five levels of evaluation (i.e., S, A, and B evaluations), confirming that many business partners are advancing initiatives related to sustainability. For those business partners that received a C or D rating, we selected one company from each business division and purchasing department for a total of five companies and exchange opinions with them concerning sustainability (in particular, business and human rights) with the objective of leading to improvements by the suppliers.
Sumitomo Metal Mining Group Sustainable Procurement Policy
■SMM Response Concerning Johnny and Associates​
Our human rights policy provides that if a supplier or other stakeholder is involved in an adverse impact on human rights, we will encourage that stakeholder to not engage in any violation of human rights and we coop- erate with corrective or remedial measures.
We believe that the sexual abuse committed by the late Johnny Kitagawa, former president of Johnny and Associates, Inc. (currently SMILE-Up. Inc.), constitutes a violation of human rights and cannot be tolerated.
SMM had a business relationship with Johnny and Associates through its supply chain in the area of corporate advertising, and as a company that was in a position to mitigate human rights risks in supply chains, we requested that Johnny and Associates take corrective action. We also performed periodic monitoring and reported our assessment to the firm.
The artist that we had engaged became independent from the agency in November 2023, and we currently do not have any business relationship with the agency. For details, please refer to the following SMM press release
