Chemical Management
Socially and environmentally conscious chemical management in supply chains requires protecting workers’ health and the mitigation of environmental impacts through responsible business and due diligence practices.
RBA members and their suppliers have made considerable progress in identifying, assessing, prioritizing, mitigating, and eliminating many harmful chemicals of concern from their products and manufacturing processes. The RBA is leading the development and dissemination of responsible chemical management conduct across supply chains to mitigate adverse impacts on the health of workers, their communities, and the environment. Advancing the sustainability of industry’s consumption of hazardous substances and chemicals requires holistic and systematic approaches to addressing chemical management risks, including facility-level environmental, health and safety practices with a strong focus on hazard identification, worker engagement, and occupational health.
Guide to Chemical Management Due Dilligence
In 2024, the RBA published its Practical Guide to Chemical Management Due Diligence in Supply Chains. Leveraging the six-step due diligence process of the OECD Due Diligence Guidance for Responsible Business Conduct, the Practical Guide seeks to promote a collective understanding among businesses, governments, NGOs, worker and employer organizations, and other stakeholders on responsible chemical management conduct. The Practical Guide promotes awareness of responsible chemical management as a global sustainability issue and communicates how members and their suppliers may navigate and use RBA resources to support chemical management due diligence practices within their supply chains.
Chemical Management Working Group
To further address the ongoing challenge of reducing risks and protecting workers across supply chains, the RBA has made chemical management a priority focus area. RBA members are working in partnership to collaborate on solutions to reduce chemical management risks through the RBA’s Chemical Management Working Group. The working group promotes the adoption of responsible chemical management conduct to reduce risks and improve transparency within supply chains and among stakeholders. The Chemical Management Working Group's efforts include:
- Increasing member awareness and involvement in the safe use of chemicals
- Development of capability-building resources to reduce harmful worker exposures, including online training courses and fact sheets for workers and managers on chemical management best practices
- Defining effective standards of practice for conducting chemical management assessments, tracking and reporting of chemicals of concern, and worker engagement on ensuring safe and healthy working environments.
- Exploring strategies to reduce usage of chemicals of concern and adopt safer alternatives, where feasible
Industry Focus Process Chemical Policy
The RBA introduced an Industry Focus Process Chemical Policy (IFPC) Policy in 2021, including a list of process chemicals of concern. Per this policy, process chemical products that contain process chemicals of concern are required to be prioritized for more advanced, permanent, and protective levels of control in accordance with the Hierarchy of Controls.
The IFPC Policy became effective January 1, 2022, and is operationalized through assessment criteria within the Validated Assessment Program (VAP) and Specialty VAP (SVAP) on Chemical Management. Learn more about the IFPC Policy here.
SVAP on Chemical Management
The RBA’s SVAP on Chemical Management (SVAP-CM) is a specialized assessment process used to identify, evaluate, and address chemical management risks of facilities’ operations. It may be used to exercise supply chain due diligence, especially at supplier facilities with chemical-intensive production processes and relatively high potential for hazardous worker exposures. SVAP-CM assessments are conducted by qualified assessors that have unique expertise in industrial hygiene, occupational safety, and environmental management.
The provisions of the SVAP-CM were carefully developed by the RBA with input from members, stakeholders, and third-party subject matter experts. It includes all provisions of the RBA’s VAP related to chemical management, as well as many complementary sub-provisions that more acutely assess occupational hygiene, workplace safety, hazard communication, emergency preparedness, hazardous materials management, and other chemical management risks.
Learn more about the SVAP-CM here.
Chemical Management Leadership Program
The sound management of chemicals is at the crossroads between environmental sustainability and human health. Many RBA members have prioritized chemical management as a key sustainability issue, and the RBA has launched a voluntary leadership program for companies in the electronics production sector to demonstrate their commitment to responsible business conduct through enhanced transparency, industry collective action, and continuous improvement.
Collectively, participating companies in the RBA’s Chemical Management Leadership Program (CMLP) are adopting and disseminating a harmonized due diligence approach on identifying, assessing, and addressing chemical management risks throughout their supply chains.
Learn more about the Chemical Management Leadership Program here.
Partnerships
The RBA partnered with the Clean Electronics Production Network (CEPN) in 2019 to collaborate on advancing responsible chemical management practices in the electronics industry. The CEPN multi-stakeholder network includes participants from the academic, government, NGOs, and business communities. As partners, the RBA and CEPN work to develop and scale effective tools and programs that can help prevent worker exposures to harmful chemicals by empowering and engaging workers; identifying and measuring process chemical consumption; and promoting safer alternatives to chemicals of concern. Several RBA member companies are also participating directly in the CEPN.
Our chemical management work has benefited significantly from the feedback of respected stakeholders and is conducted in collaboration with various IGOs, NGOs, industry associations, standards development organizations, and civil society groups. We recognize there is still much work to do around the safe use and sustainable consumption of chemicals. The RBA and its members are committed to staying the course, working with multistakeholder partners, and making meaningful progress on this important issue.
