HONDA

Global Citizenship & Equity Assignment

Fernanda F. Bainy – 301235849

Juan German Picon – 301209543

Manpreet Singh Chawla - 301217955

Intro Suppy Chain Business Operations – Sec 001

Centennial College

Fall 2022
Honda is considered a socially responsible company since it has been actively enhancing its
production processes, assembly facilities, supplier partnerships, and supply chain operations to
become a more competitive and sustainable future-oriented company. 

When it comes to ethical practices, Honda is a company that is driven by honesty, inclusion and
respect, and community contribution. Honda fosters an environment of transparency and
ethical behavior based on a “no tolerance to bribery or corruption within the company”.
Moreover, Honda values diversity in the work environment since it brings innovation, richness in
points of view,  and  

The core values that Honda promotes are Initiative, trust, and equality. When it comes to
sustainability, all these 3 values get into action:

Initiative: Have an open mind position to act on your own initiatives, meanwhile, being
accountable for the outcomes of your actions. 

Trust: Honda’s work environment fosters mutual trust, collaboration, and openness to receive
and offer help whenever needed in order to achieve organizational goals.

Equality: Honda stands up for equality of opportunities regardless of age, gender, sexual
orientation, religion, and social or economic status. 

Furthermore, Honda has outlined in its code of conduct several ethical practices towards
customers, business partners, the work environment, society, political entities, shareholders,
investors, and stakeholders.

https://global.honda/about/philosophy.html

Relationship with customers:

Quality of products and services:  The company’s top priority is to comply with quality standards
and procedures of products and services. Also, is required for business partners and suppliers to
adhere to Honda’s quality grade.

Appropriate advertising and publicity: Hondas’ advertising campaigns must be trustworthy and
meet the expectations of consumers.

Compliance with competition laws: For maintaining its credibility with its consumers, Honda
commits to maintaining transparent competition with other automotive companies. 

Relationship with business partners:

Sound business practices: Honda commits to being involved in a transparent competition

environment, nurturing long-term relationships, and partner elections while complying with
company policies.

Work environment:
Communication in the workplace: Honda works to increase reliance among employees to cause
cohesiveness.

Respect for human rights: Honda is a company that looks forward to maintaining equality and
honesty towards human rights. 

Safety and health: Commitment to provide workers with a safe environment and adhere to the
corresponding health and safety regulations.

Relationships with Honda:

Company assets: All company assets will be allocated effectively to meet organizational goals.

Management of information: All undisclosed information regarding business partners, suppliers,

customers, and the company itself must be properly managed and not misused.

Conflicts of interest: To guarantee the accomplishment of organizational objectives, actions of

partners that interfere with Honda’s interests are forbidden.

Relationship with society:

Traffic safety: Honda will improve its technology to provide society with safe driving.

Environmental protection: Honda is striving to reduce environmental pollution by adopting

sustainable practices such as the reuse and optimization of materials.

Contribution to society: Through community service initiatives, such as donations to charities,

Honda is expected to achieve its social responsibility objectives.

Relationship with political and administrative entities:

Relationship with political and administrative entities: Honda looks forward to maintaining long-
term relationships with political and administrative entities and prohibits any kind of bribery.

Relationships with shareholders, investors, and other stakeholders:

Timely and appropriate disclosure of information: Communicate in a timely and effective

manner with stakeholders in order to preserve an honest relationship.

Compliance and reporting Non-compliance incidents:

Compliance and ethics: Honda and its employees must comply with the respective laws and
policies while behaving ethically.

Reporting non-compliance incidents: If there’s any breach of abiding laws or company policies,
the act must be denounced to the corresponding entity (manager or legal department).

Honda has adopted many sustainable sourcing strategies to contribute to the preservation of the
environment and human rights compliance, for them to fulfill their responsibility in society.
Honda joined an initiative, called Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP’s), which its objective is to
call companies to reveal their Greenhouse Gas and CO2 emissions to the environment. CDP has
helped Honda company to reduce its GHG and CO2 releases, even getting a perfect score in
2014 for taking action against global warming.  Also, Honda uses this disclosure system when it
comes to supplier selection, fostering sustainability in supply chain operations.

Another initiative Honda is working to develop is a more efficient way for container
transportation to reduce environmental impact. “This initiative consists in transporting auto parts
directly to the seaport if the container loading rate is already high at the time of shipment at
suppliers and if these suppliers are located closer to the port in order to shorten the transport
distance (Toyota, 2020, p.138)”. 

Additionally, another approach that Honda puts into practice when selecting its suppliers, is
filtering all their business partners by their adherence to Honda’s policies and evaluating its
initiatives when it comes to quality, logistics, environment, human rights, and safety regulations
to decide the best socially responsible supplier. 

Purchasing initiatives:

Chemical substances management: Honda has adopted this strategy in order to decrease its
environmental footprint due to the usage of chemical substances in their products. For this
strategy, Honda, and its suppliers, must meet laws while procuring components for final products
to decrease potential hazardous materials to be released into nature. 

Requiring legal compliance from suppliers: Within the supply chain associates, Honda requires
compliance with local regulations on the materials produced by its suppliers, meeting safety and
environmental impact standards.

Third-party audit for suppliers: Honda conducts periodic reviews of its suppliers to verify
compliance with company policies. These inspections are to measure how susceptible suppliers
are to risks related to lack of adherence to human rights (no tolerance for human trafficking,
forced labor, or child exploitation), environmental impact, facility safety, and minimum wage
compliance. This inspection process is based on 4 stages: locating the high-risk area,
understanding the situation within the supplier, suggestion for improvement, and finally
feedback.

Sustainable product and/or packaging design. Be sure to include specific examples.

Honda has developed over the years better ways to transport auto components for their final
products in order to reduce environmental footprint and operational costs. Honda used to pack its
materials in thick cardboard boxes that were also protected by an external metal structure that at
the end of their delivery process was discarded, generating a lot of waste. Honda, being a
company with a sustainable vision, set out to reduce its waste levels by implementing reusable
metal outer packaging, as well as transitioning from cardboard boxes to reusable material
containers with the feature of being able to be folded and shipped back to the exporter. With this
new method, Honda has decreased its shipment weights, therefore diminishing, waste and CO2
emissions.
On the other hand, Honda has been improving its technology to incursion in the hybrid and 
Electric-Vehicle (EV) niche, for them to substitute all their fossil fuel vehicles and achieve their
goal of C02 neutrality.

Honda’s first electric vehicle it’s called Honda-e. Is a subcompact car/supermini, which is an
emission-free car.

Two vehicles that have been already developed by Honda that perform into the segment of
Hybrids are the “Accord Hybrid” and the “CR-V Hybrid”

Honda is planning to partner up with GM (General Motors) to develop their first Electric
Vehicle SUV, called Honda Prologue by 2024, and it will be the milestone for their journey to
accomplish the CO2 neutrality goal by 2050. 

For Honda, is a priority to treat their associates and employees, throughout the company and its
suppliers, fairly and humanely, in order to provide a quality and honest work environment. Using
“Ethical initiative base codes clauses”, Honda implements the following clauses in their
everyday processes.

“Employment is freely chosen”: Any source of human trafficking or forced labor, within Honda
company and its business partners, won’t be tolerated, since slavery practices are against the
corporate human rights policies.

“Freedom of association and the right to collective bargaining are respected”: Honda
management is open to receiving feedback, concerns, and complaints from its crew members.
Also, employees are in the right to form or join unions without fear of retaliation.

“Child labor shall not be used”: Employees need to reach the minimum age to work within
Honda company according to local regulations and laws.

“Living wages are paid”: Provide employees with fair compensation according to local
regulations.

“Working hours are not excessive”: Working hours shall comply will local laws. Honda doesn’t
tolerate workforce exploitation or any kind of slavery.

“No discrimination is practiced”: Honda looks forward to Inclusion within the work environment
to ensure harmony and productivity. Discrimination based on race, sexual orientation, gender,
religion, disabilities, and age, among others, will be sanctioned. 

“No harsh or inhumane treatment is allowed”: Inhumane treatment and sexual harassment won’t
be permitted.

“Working conditions are safe and hygienic”: Honda must provide employees with a safe work
environment, complying with local safety standards.
References:

Honda. (N.A.). Honda Human Rights Policy. Retrieved from:

https://global.honda/sustainability/human_rights_policy/

Honda. (N.A.). The Honda Policy To Human Trafficking. Retrieved from:

https://csr.honda.com/longform-content/the-honda-policy-against-human-trafficking/

Honda. (2022). Honda Electric Automobiles. Retrieved from:

https://automobiles.honda.com/vehicle-electrification?source=https%3a%2f
%2fautomobiles.honda.com%2fhybrid-family&statusCode=301

Honda. (2022). Honda e. Retrieved from:

https://www.honda.co.uk/cars/new/honda-e/overview.html#electric

Honda. (2014). Honda Earns Perfect Climate Disclosure Score of 100 Points in CDP Global 500
Climate Change Report 2014. Retrieved from:
https://hondanews.eu/eu/en/corporate/media/pressreleases/4075/honda-earns-perfect-climate-
disclosure-score-of-100-points-in-cdp-global-500-climate-change-report-2

Honda. (2016). Honda Code of Conduct. Retrieved from:

https://global.honda/about/assets/codeofconduct/pdf/HondaCodeofConduct_en.pdf

Honda. (N.A.). Honda Philosophy. Retrieved from: https://global.honda/about/philosophy.html

Honda. (N.A.). Honda Corporate Responsibility Statement. Retrieved from:

https://csr.honda.com/longform-content/honda-corporate-responsibility-statement/

Honda (2021). Honda Sustainability Report. Retrieved from:

https://global.honda/sustainability/cq_img/report/pdf/2021/Honda-SR-2021-en-133-145.pdf