ABB Sustainable Supply Base Management Program

ABB is committed to responsible sourcing and helping our partners meet the challenges of responsible manufacturing.

ABB has factories in about 100 countries, making products and realizing projects with the help of more than 60,000 materials and service suppliers. Together, ABB and its suppliers have the responsibility to run their business in a sustainable way. This means that each of us is obeying international and local laws, taking action to limit environmental impacts, respecting the legal and human rights of workers, and implementing effective health and safety policies, within both our own operations and the ex-tended supply chain.

The ABB Supplier Code of Conduct (SCoC) clearly outlines our expectations, based on principles con-tained within the International Bill of Human Rights, the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises, the ILO Core Conventions on Labor Stand-ards, and all applicable laws and principles in the areas of human rights and decent work. It is updated periodically to address new developments.

We expect our suppliers to respect the same international principles and standards of human rights.

ABB has also implemented the Sustainable Supply Base Management (SSBM) approach to improve the sustainability performance of our suppliers, especially those exposed to sustainability risks. 

SSBM addresses sustainability topics and performance at each stage of supplier life cycle manage-ment, as part of our “beyond audit” approach. It covers issues in six main categories: general man-agement, human and labor rights, social benefits, health, safety, and the environment.

As part of our new supplier onboarding process, the supplier is requested to perform a sustainability self-assessment. Depending on the result of this self-assessment and other important parameters, further due diligence may be performed, such as an onsite sustainability assessment.

Once a supplier is part of ABB’s supply base, a risk-based approach is followed for monitoring a sup-plier’s sustainability performance through self-assessments. We also engage with selected suppliers for training, onsite assessments, and follow-up audits until all findings are finalized.

Find out more about the Sustainable Supply Base Management program here.