Henkel recently announced it has joined forces with five additional chemical companies in a new collaborative initiative, “Together for Sustainability.” Henkel will reportedly work with BASF, Bayer MaterialScience, Evonik Industries, LANXESS and Solvay to harmonize the complex supply management and optimize the joint dialogue with global business partners.

The sustainability collaboration holds the basic idea of “an audit for one is an audit for all,” meaning that audit reports are available to all member companies, and the results of supplier assessments are shared on a web-based platform. This exchange can enable the suppliers to do only one “self-assessment” or a single audit in future years and helps to standardize the assessments and audit criteria globally.

The initiative’s pilot phase has reportedly been successfully completed. In 2012, the member companies selected a total of 2,000 suppliers for assessments (worldwide) and audits (150 chemical companies in China). On the basis of the experience gained, the initiative is expected to increase its engagement in further sourcing markets (focus on Brazil, China and India) and will also add new members in the upcoming years

For more information, visit www.henkel.com.