Ethical sourcing means being mindful of many factors when choosing materials and products. These can include human rights, employment rights, environmental impact and ethics.
Ethical companies choose suppliers who pay fair wages and have safe working conditions. For example, fair trade products have been sourced from suppliers who have agreed to pay fair prices for commodities.
They pay attention to how goods and raw materials are made. Do the manufacturing processes use chemicals that are detrimental to the environment? What natural resources and energy are required to produce the products?
They make sure that suppliers are ethical in their dealings and transparent about their own supply chain.
Fair trading of commodities
Source Climate Change Coffee imports coffee to the UK from countries across the world. They support growers who are planting and harvesting coffee using sustainable farming practices. They encourage farmers to get involved in reforestation projects and teach them how to grow crops alongside trees.
Divine Chocolate works with cocoa farmers in a similar way. They are a social enterprise and they work closely with the Kuapa Kokoo Farmers’ Union. The union are shareholders in Divine Chocolate and pay dividends to their farmers. This collaboration was a first in the fair trade world.
Aarven Goods works with artists from across the globe, bringing their products to the UK and selling them from the store in Margate in Kent. This increases the artists’ exposure and income. Aarven carries out in-person audits, following the fair trade principles to ensure that all the goods they purchase meet high standards of environmental and social governance.
Sourcing locally
Ethical sourcing doesn’t always require importing materials and products from across the globe. Sourcing locally can reduce the carbon emissions that are generated by transporting items across the world. Many of our members source materials from within a very close range of their business.
Sustainable Rope sources all the British wool that it uses to make rope, braid and fabric within a 60 mile radius of their workshops. Wool is a sustainable and renewable material that is also biodegradable. Sustainable Rope buys the wool at auction from British farmers, supporting the local economy and paying them a fair return.
James Ince Umbrellas 1908 sources as many of their components locally as possible. They buy them through the Supplier Ethical Data Exchange (Sedex) to ensure traceability and sustainability. They have worked hard to develop a sustainable and virtually plastic free umbrella. Not an easy thing to do as most umbrellas use petroleum based fabrics like polyester. They also employ local workers and are a Living Wage employer.
The Ethical Stone Company sources local aggregates from places across the UK. They make them into terrazzo tiles that tell a story about the British landscape. The tiles are made in Manchester and the company makes every effort to reduce transport miles as much as possible. They bind the aggregate with a sustainable low carbon cement and reuse materials from demolition and refurbishments, which saves on quarrying new materials.
Ethical sourcing helps to reduce the impact of manufacturing
Ethical sourcing is critical to reducing the impact of manufacturing on the environment. It can save new materials from being extracted or virgin forests from being cut down. It also ensures that the person who grows the commodity or works for the company is paid a fair price and can earn a living wage. It prevents unfair labour practices and child labour.
Ethical sourcing involves looking for alternative materials and ways to reduce transport emissions and energy consumption. It incentivises ethical practices and transparency from suppliers. All these factors reduce our impact on the planet and make the world a fairer place to work. Is your business ethical? We’d love to hear about it.
