Ecovadis 2018 ratings: SPIE once again in the top 1% of the most sustainable companies

Special mention made of good practices in “sustainable purchasing”

Cergy, October 3rd, 2018 – This year, SPIE once again features among the companies with the best-performing corporate social responsibility policies according to the ratings established by the EcoVadis platform. Since 2010, the Group’s score has continued to improve across the 21 environmental, social, ethical and sustainable purchasing evaluation criteria. SPIE particularly distinguished itself in the area of sustainable purchasing.

As the world’s leading platform that takes account of responsibility commitments in the customer/supplier relationship, EcoVadis has been tasked with evaluating SPIE’s CSR policy since 2010. The extremely demanding scoring criteria imposed by EcoVadis are based on international sustainable development standards such as the Global Reporting Initiative, the ISO 26000 standard and the UN Global Compact. SPIE’s sustainable purchasing policy, which is a priority of the Group’s purchasing strategy for 2020, has been awarded ten additional points in 2018, propelling SPIE to its highest ever score in the EcoVadis ratings (76/100). Moreover, thanks to this score, SPIE was awarded the CSR award in the SBF 80 category of the ‘Grands prix du Gouvernement d’Entreprise’ (grand prizes for corporate governance) organised by L’Agefi.

A sustainable purchasing policy integrated within all of the subsidiaries

Six priorities have been defined in the 2017-2020 purchasing strategy, including sustainable purchasing and ethics. The sustainable purchasing approach is integrated in the Group’s CSR policy and is based on a number of ambitious criteria: 40% of total spending must be evaluated by an independent and external body and 100% of purchasers must be trained in business ethics.

At present, approximately 30% of SPIE’s purchases are evaluated by EcoVadis, and suppliers are regularly approached by SPIE, for example at “Supplier Days”, to encourage them to update their offerings with regard to product innovation and commercial propositions.

“For us, responsible purchasing constitutes an objective and lever for action in the same way that cost reduction does”, explains Laurent Leschi, Group Purchasing Director. “All of our teams have been made aware of this, in all of the subsidiaries. CSR is one of the main criteria for supplier and subcontractor selection and evaluation.”

Among the main factors that contributed to SPIE’s higher rating in 2018 are the governance put in place to manage sustainable purchasing by means of a dedicated committee, quantified targets, and a detailed action plan. The 19% increase in spending with suppliers that employ workers with disabilities and the implementation of an action plan to prevent risk in subcontracting management were also commended.

“Corporate social responsibility is increasingly important for our investors, customers and employees. Our CSR governance and actions become more structured every year. CSR best practice sharing and implementation are continuously improving throughout the group. We are honored that our efforts have been recognized by the Ecovadis Gold rating and the Agefi's CSR prize”, explains Pablo Ibanez, Group Operational Support Director, Executive Committee member and group CSR Committee member.