BHP recognises that many men, women and children are victims today of human rights abuses and a growth in regulatory instruments around the world is indicative of the increasing expectations on businesses to help address applicable human rights risks.

We remain committed to the ongoing partnership with our suppliers to build long-lasting, productive and sustainable relationships to unlock shared value for all of our businesses. As the world’s leading resources company with a procurement spend of USD $20 billion across 10,000 suppliers, BHP recognises the responsibility and opportunity we have to identify, understand and seek to mitigate human rights risks across our supply chain together.

A key next step in our shared sustainability journey sees the launch of the BHP Ethical Supply Chain program, which engages our suppliers in efforts to manage human rights risks throughout their supply chains, and position ourselves to respond to the evolving human rights landscape across our supply chain.

“The Ethical Supply Chain program continues our commitment to increasing the level of transparency in our Supply Chain and partnering with our supply base to do this – it remains a critical consideration for anyone that wants to do business with us. With the current COVID-19 pandemic we must continue our positive collaboration and recognise the need to be aware of and reactive to the risks for downstream supply chain workers and vulnerable people. Human Rights violations are the furthest anyone could possibly be from the shared value we want to generate with our partners.” said BHP’s Chief Procurement Officer Sundeep Singh.

BHP’s Ethical Supply Chain Guide provides industry standards and guiding principles to help suppliers develop their own policies and processes to meet the recently updated Minimum Requirements for Suppliers. Adhering to these minimum requirements are a prerequisite to doing business with BHP. The program will be underpinned by supplier due diligence processes, which will be managed by our Ethical Supply Chain team.

For further information on BHP’s current obligations and actions taken to date, please refer to the Modern Slavery Act Statement.