Supplier Sustainability
To Howmet Aerospace Suppliers:
As part of our company’s commitment to sustainability, we consider the environmental, social and economic impact when evaluating the total cost of materials and services. We also strive to build relationships with suppliers who behave in a responsible and sustainable manner.
We expect all suppliers, contractors and others with whom we conduct business to follow our Supplier Code of Conduct. We also recognize the critical role our suppliers play in helping us achieve our sustainability goals and how we can help them drive sustainability into their own processes and practices.
We measure the sustainability of our key suppliers through our Global Supplier Sustainability Program. Click on any of the component links below for program details.
Click the links below to see program details.
Communicate Expectations
Communicating our expectations to our suppliers is a critical component of our supplier sustainability program. Some of the ways we communicate these expectations include:
- Supplier Code of Conduct document; and
- Contractual language within our standard terms and conditions.
Supplier Code of Conduct
As part of Howmet Aerospace’s continuing commitment to sustainable business practices, we are dedicated to working in partnership with our suppliers to follow our Supplier Code of Conduct.
Our Supplier Code of Conduct set forth:
- Our commitment to environmental, social and economic practices.
- Our expectations of suppliers, contractors and others with whom we conduct business (collectively referred to as “Suppliers”) with respect to sound and responsible environmental, social and economic practices.
We recognize that there are different legal and cultural environments in which suppliers operate throughout the world. This code set forth the minimum requirements that suppliers must meet to do business with us. In order to comply with these requirements, suppliers should communicate the principles of these standards throughout their supply chain.
We expect and trust that you will honor the environmental, social, and economic principles and practices stated in Howmet Aerospace’s Supplier Code of Conduct.
Standard Terms and Conditions
In an effort to clearly communicate Howmet Aerospace’s expectations with regards to supplier sustainability, we have added contractual language regarding Supplier Standards to the North American Standard Terms and Conditions.
Assess Supplier
As part of Howmet Aerospace’s continuing commitment to sustainability, dependent on risk we assess our suppliers’ ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) maturity level through a third party.
The intent of the assessment is to promote an open and constructive dialogue to better understand the practices of our suppliers and reduce risk by addressing improvement opportunities. An honest and transparent supplier assessment represents a first step toward working with suppliers to improve sustainability throughout the supply chain.
The assessment questionnaire focuses on four areas:
- Environment
- Labor & human rights
- Ethics
- Sustainable Procurement
To complete the assessment, please click here.
Ultimately, it is our expectation that our Supplier’s will obtain a minimum overall score of 40 and minimum theme scores of 40 in environment, labor & human rights, and ethics. Under performance will result in action plans being established, up to and including an exit plan if engagement is not sufficient in areas of concern.
Suppliers should contact their dedicated Procurement professional for further information or questions concerning the assessment or Howmet’s overall Supplier Sustainability Program.
Industry Alignment & Advantages for Suppliers
The Third party conducting Howmet´s supplier ESG assessments has been selected by IAEG, the International Aerospace Environmental Group, an association of leading Aerospace, Defense and Security (AD&S) companies that together represent more than 70% of the whole industry globally, to conduct Environment, Social and Governance (ESG) performance assessments for the aerospace and defense supply chain.
Howmet is among the sponsors of this industry initiative, which aims to improve sustainability performance in the AD&S industry and the extended supply chain, assessing industry participants with an industry standard shared by key AD&S companies.
This industry wide approach provides several benefits to suppliers:
- Suppliers can complete a single industry-wide assessment can be shared with multiple customers, instead of having to undergo multiple different customer assessments. This is a significant benefit for suppliers in terms of process’ effectiveness and cost reduction.
- Suppliers can access the third party assessment platform on advantageous terms.
- Suppliers can leverage the resources in the platform to train their personnel and support their own ESG performance improvement.
Educate Supplier
Areas of opportunity are identified through the Supplier Sustainability Questionnaire. Individually, Howmet Aerospace will share with each supplier our perspective of the results and discuss opportunities for improvement.
Monitor Progress
We will periodically reassess our suppliers to evaluate if any changes have occurred that would influence a supplier’s maturity level rating. It is our expectation that a supplier’s maturity level should improve over time.