Our supply chain

Sustainability

Cutting emissions and maximizing opportunities in close collaboration with our suppliers.

Managing supply chain sustainability

At Beckers, we strongly believe that our climate goal of a 50% CO₂e intensity reduction from third-party logistics by 2030 can only be achieved in cooperation with our key suppliers. This is why we look beyond our own operations and invite our suppliers to join us on our journey by working together on more sustainable solutions and pursuing constant improvements.

Why a sustainable supply chain is material to us

Read more about the risks and opportunities associated with a sustainable supply chain and our materiality assessment in our Performance Report 2023.

Performance Report

As our suppliers have a significant impact on our sustainability performance and our ability to reach our climate goals, we must make sure that they act responsibly and comply with our sustainability guidelines.

We do this by building close collaborations and partnerships with our suppliers and ensuring mutual commitments to responsible business conduct and to step by step work to reduce carbon footprint along the supply chain.

Beckers’ overall goal is a 100% alignment of our global supply chain partners with our responsible sourcing strategy by 2030. Specifically, this means:

We continuously work to ensure our entire supply base abides by our Supplier Code of Conduct. Our Supplier Code of Conduct is an important and mandatory part of the supplier onboarding procedure.
85% of our raw material suppliers (based on spend) must be assessed and approved by our sustainability rating system.
100% of our high-risk suppliers are audited on regular basis.

How we contribute to supply chain sustainability

We want all our upstream supply chain partners to operate in accordance with the same sustainability standards as we do. In 2023, we had 817 active direct suppliers for raw materials and packaging on five continents. Our key raw materials are sourced from fine chemical industry suppliers. It is fundamental that we build and maintain long-term relations with all suppliers, cooperate to achieve better synergies and that we understand, assess, and mitigate potential risks.

The importance of resilient and sustainable supply chains

In recent years, Beckers’ supply chains have been strained due to external challenges and various crises in the last years. Looking ahead, there are not necessarily easy solutions to mitigate our supply chain challenges. But we analyze where the greatest risks occur and the magnitude of challenges along the supply chain. During the year, we considerably strengthened our data reporting structure as well as our ability to react internally to determine the right action.

Our three-step process for responsible sourcing

Our ambition is to continuously improve the performance of our suppliers. Assessing our suppliers is essential and the process involves a comprehensive analysis of key factors, including supplier performance, quality control, financial stability, responsiveness, and adherence to our ethical and sustainability standards. The potential environmental and social risks that we have identified include human and children’s rights, local pollution, waste management, the environment and the sourcing of raw materials, resource efficiency and carbon emissions. Assessing suppliers is essential to optimize quality and reliability in our supply chain. Through our Chain-up! program, which reflects our responsible sourcing strategy, we ensure a three-step process that helps us to identify, monitor, control and forecast potential hazards at an early stage to mitigate and resolve risks.

Sign and adhere to the Supplier Code of Conduct

We have a collaborative tool to help our sites around the world to manage the process locally and monitor the status of every supplier with the help of our Supplier Code of Conduct.

In 2023, our suppliers representing 92% of our global spend have signed or been evaluated in alignment with our Supplier Code of Conduct. We continue to develop our monitoring process to work toward 100%.

Conduct third-party assessments

Our third-party assessments are conducted by EcoVadis. The sustainability ratings platform covers a broad range of non-financial management systems including environment, labor and human rights, ethics, and sustainable procurement impacts. A supplier must score a minimum of 40 points in each of the four themes of the assessment to receive Beckers’ approval. Those who fail must implement a transparent corrective action plan before being reassessed.

In 2023, we nearly reached our 2030 target of 85% of our suppliers (based on spend) assessed and approved by Ecovadis. We increased 4%-pts compared to last year, reaching 84.9%. So close, but still work to be done!

Conduct in-house audits

During 2023, we conducted our own in-house audits with 2 selected key suppliers to verify their compliance with our sustainability and quality expectations. The audited suppliers are selected based on a risk assessment that includes factors such as industry or sector, self-assessment results, length of relationship and previous performance.

Continuous improvements with an annual supplier performance evaluation

To complement the Chain-up! program, we also conduct annual performance evaluations of key suppliers. The annual supplier performance evaluations give us a global overview – not only of supply quality but also how those companies score on R&D and sustainability. This tool and process helps us to enhance the overall efficiency and effectiveness of our procurement process. In 2023, our global Supply Chain, Procurement and R&D teams diligently reviewed and assessed 142 key suppliers.

Based on the evaluation results, we identified several key suppliers that met or exceeded our sustainability expectations and demonstrated their ability to consistently deliver high-quality products. These suppliers will continue to be an integral part of our supply chain. Additionally, we have identified some areas for improvement and initiated dialogues with certain suppliers to address any concerns or issues that were identified during the evaluation. Our aim is to work collaboratively with them to enhance their performance and strengthen our supplier relationships.

2023 Supplier Award

Novaresine, a leading supplier of polyester resins in Europe, exemplifies dedication to sustainability through collaborative efforts with Beckers Group. Novaresine’s proactive approach and genuine eagerness to contribute have propelled joint sustainability projects, enhancing Beckers’ environmental stewardship. Recognized with the 2023 Supplier Award, Novaresine’s commitment to responsible business practices is celebrated, reinforcing the shared journey towards a more sustainable future.

Bruno Franceschini, CEO of Novaresine shares, “Our partnership with Beckers has played a crucial role in spearheading sustainability initiatives. The collaborative journey we’ve embarked on has inspired us to persist in our commitment to sustainability.”

Pilot project: Reduced footprint from inbound and outbound material supply

With the aim to reduce the scope 3 CO₂ footprint from our inbound material supply between suppliers and our sites, we have run a pilot project with key suppliers. Our suppliers found opportunities to reduce CO₂ emissions through collaboration as we optimized the goods for delivery and the conversion from road to multi-modal transportation. Also, the pilot investigated the opportunities and effects on Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) such as supply lead time and on-time delivery.

There are challenges related to cost and delivery time with multi-modal transportation, as well as issues with railway networks. However, our aim is to increase our proportion of multi-modal transport, which is currently around 30% of our upstream logistics. In 2023, we kicked off a new pilot to drive more sustainable logistics with selected customers in outbound logistics. The pilot focuses on our own freight forwarding partners that we will continue to work with to find logistics solutions with lower climate and environmental impact.

From left to right: Paul Corbignot (Liss transport), Morgane Fayolle (Beckers France), Karine Corbignot (Liss transport) , Didier Rochet (Beckers Group), Julien Enjolras (Beckers France), Tomas Becker (Covestro), Berta Vega-Sanchez (Covestro), Saifedine Bergaoui (Beckers Group), Andrey Sherman (Covestro)

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