Projects & Collaborations
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Having identified complementarities between their tools, the Global Social Compliance Programme (GSCP) and the International Trade Centre (ITC) collaborated to develop interoperability between their respective platforms. This work entailed:
- A meticulous mapping of the ITC Standards Map and the criteria of the GSCP Reference tools to identify overlap; and,
- Substantial IT developments to transfer data from the ITC Standards Map onto the Equivalence Process platform, allowing shared users to capitalise on the data already uploaded in the ITC Standards Map.
An IT bridge is now up and running that allows any organization that has referenced its standards in the Standards Map to call on the data and transfer it to their Equivalence Process session in order to build on it and perform their detailed Self-Assessment in the GSCP benchmarking platform.
This new functionality facilitates the standards’ work on the Equivalence Process Self-Assessment and encourages standards, once having analysed their policies through the ITC Standards Map, to challenge their systems’ processes through the GSCP Equivalence Process.
For more information on the Global Social Compliance Programme: www.gscpnet.com/
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Sustainability Standards Comparison Tool - SSCT
The International Trade Centre (ITC) partners with the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) and ISEAL Alliance on the development of a tool for comparing the credibility of sustainability standards. GIZ implements the project in behalf of the German Federal Government. The comparison tool will allow users to evaluate and compare both the content of sustainability standards (e.g. child labour or habitat destruction) and the processes that support compliance with those standards (e.g. standard-setting or certification), based on their own preferences. The Tool will be based on the T4SD standards data base and a prototype made available online for testing towards the end of 2014.
For more information on ISEAL Alliance: www.iseal.org
For more information on GIZ: www.giz.de/sozialstandards
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AIM-PROGRESS is a forum of consumer goods manufacturers and suppliers assembled to enable and promote responsible sourcing practices and sustainable production systems. It is a global initiative supported and sponsored by AIM in Europe and GMA in North America. AIM-PROGRESS seeks to promote responsible sourcing while reducing the duplication of supplier assessments. In order to reduce audit duplication, costs and fatigue, AIM-PROGRESS members may recognize supplier audits completed on behalf of another company through the Mutual Recognition mechanism that is supported by ITC using the Standards Map database.
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The Floriculture Sustainability Initiative – FSI is developing with support from IDH an equivalency tool as a non-metric barometer that compares standards and certification schemes in an objective way. FSI members represent a wide range of companies, associations, standards and CSOs, covering the global floriculture supply chain from grower to retail. ITC Standards Map is supporting the work of FSI together with two main partners: GSCP and GlobalG.A.P. For more information, please look at http://www.fsi2020.com.
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The State of Sustainability Initiatives (SSI) project seeks to enhance global understanding and learning about the role and potential of market-based voluntary sustainability initiatives (VSS) such as eco-labels, sustainability standards and roundtables in the promotion of sustainable development. By providing objective, reliable and timely information on the characteristics, performance and market trends associated with voluntary sustainability initiatives, the SSI will facilitate more strategic decision-making and continual improvement across VSS.
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Since 2010, the SHDB project has offered a “user portal” in its website, allowing users to browse data on social risks by sector, or by country, or by risk theme. An updated version of that data portal is being released in March 2013. The data comprehensively address social issues, human rights, working conditions, community impacts and governance issues, via a set of nearly 150 risk indicators grouped within 22 themes. Risks are also expressed, whenever relevant, by sector. The project as grown since 2009 and offers additional tools, advisory services and a Linkedin discussion forum.
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COSA is a global consortium of 43 institutions dedicated to accelerating the social, economic, and environmental elements of agricultural sustainability. We focus primarily in developing countries and work with farmers and local communities to develop indicators and assessment systems to better measure and manage the sustainability of agri-food systems. Our work spans hundreds of supply chains in three continents where we have conducted tens of thousands of assessment surveys to improve the sustainability of food crops and cash crops.
Technical Partners
Donors
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Development cooperation aims to help resolve crises and conflicts in a peaceful manner. It aims to help ensure that scarce resources are more equitably shared, and that our environment is preserved for coming generations. And it aims to help reduce global poverty. In order to achieve these goals, development policy must target different levels. And of course we cannot lose sight of the fact that foreign policy, trade policy, security policy and development policy are today very closely linked. This makes the mandate of the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) wide and varied.
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SECO is Switzerland's federal government's centre of expertise for all core issues relating to economic policy. Its aim is to ensure sustainable economic growth by putting in place the necessary regulatory and economic policy conditions.
SECO has two main objectives: to support the integration of partner countries into the global economy, and to promote their sustainable economic growth, thus contributing to poverty reduction. In order to do this, SECO intervenes principally to promote stable economic framework conditions, to strengthen competitiveness and to support trade diversification, to mobilise Swiss and foreign investment and to improve the basic infrastructure. Particular attention is paid to questions concerning economic governance, the climate, energy and the environmental issues.
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The Commission is divided into several departments and services. The departments are known as Directorates-General (DGs).
The Directorate General for Trade of the European Commission is in charge of implementing the common trade policy of the European Union. It helps through the EU's trade policy to secure prosperity, solidarity and security in Europe and around the globe. It supports the EU's Trade Commissioner Karel De Gucht and the whole of the European Commission in shaping a trade environment that is good for people and for business.
They are committed to helping world trade and development, thereby boosting competitiveness, jobs and growth in the process.
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Hivos is an international development organisation guided by humanist values. Together with local civil society organisations in developing countries, Hivos wants to contribute to a free, fair and sustainable world. A world in which all citizens – both women and men – have equal access to opportunities and resources for development and can participate actively and equally in decision-making processes that determine their lives, their society and their future.