Human Rights Policies

Human Rights Policies

Based on our corporate philosophy of effectively using Earth's limited resources, creating new value from resources through surface modification of all sorts of materials, and contributing to the preservation of the global environment and realization of an affluent society, the Nihon Parkerizing Group has established the Code of Conduct for Executives and Regular Employees and shared it throughout the Group.
To contribute to the realization of a sustainable society, our Group endeavors to fulfill our responsibilities to respect all our stakeholders' human rights, including customers, business partners, shareholders, investors, local communities, and employees.

Compliance with the core labor standards established by the International Labour Organization (ILO) and initiatives

Our Group adheres to the basic principles of the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights, ILO Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work, and OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises.

List of ILO conventions

Nihon Parkerizing Group Human Rights Policies

• Freedom of association and right of collective bargaining
  Article 87 (article on the protection of the freedom of association and the right to organize)
  Article 98 (article on the application of principles of the right to organize and the right of collective bargaining)
  

  Respect for the freedom of association and the right of collective bargaining
  We have a union shop, which means our full-time employees automatically join the union when employed. The company has set up a biannual labor-management consultation as an occasion for approvals and recommendations. This is where it explains important management matters to the labor union.
  Some of our overseas group companies may have labor unions. The company also explains critical management decisions to the unions in advance through periodic labor-management dialogues and focuses on creating good labor-management relations based on which the business develops.

• Prohibition against forced labor
  Article 29 (article on forced labor)
  Article 105 (article on the abolishment of forced labor)
• Effective abolishment of child labor
  Article 138 (article on the minimum working age)
  Article 182 (article on prohibition of the worst form of child labor and immediate action for abolishment)

  Prohibition against forced labor and child labor
  The company employs workers in compliance with the laws and regulations in each country to prevent forced work against their will and child labor to support basic human rights.

• Elimination of discrimination at employment and occupation
  Article 100 (article on the same compensation for the same work regardless of gender)
  Article 111 (article on discriminating treatment at employment and occupation)

  Prohibition against discrimination
  Our Group believes that we must make fair evaluations according to job descriptions and business performance to determine employment or treatment and must not discriminate based on race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, age, nationality, language, difficulties, or any other reason and has established and shared the Code of Conduct for Executives and Regular Employees across the Group.

• Basic philosophy for diversity promotion
  According to the words of our founder, people are the basis of business. We are aware that we must respect the values of each employee and draw on each other's strengths to continue to meet diversifying customer needs as globalization rapidly proceeds.
  We continue to promote diversity to transform each employee's willingness to work and work style.
  

  Proactive participation of women
  The company supports the career progression of female employees, for example, by organizing internal seminars for female employees and managers so that women can achieve greater success.

  Senior human resources
  The company has established an employment system for people over sixty to work even after the statutory age of obligatory retirement defined by the government, if they wish. As part of the personnel system reform in April 2018, we improved the compensation system to take performance level into consideration more than in the past, expecting the proactive participation of senior human resources. In this system, employees can strengthen the economic stability of their post-retirement years based on their performance.

  Global human resources
  As our overseas business develops, we are focusing on employment and the development of global human resources. We proactively employ non-Japanese overseas and have established an environment to accept cross-cultural human resources as part of our diversity efforts. We provide language training focused on speaking ability and overseas training for young employees based on our belief that overseas experience is important.

  Initiatives for promotion of self-development
  We promote self-development to support aspiring employees. Employees can attend business skills improvement seminars at business school if they wish. We also have a financial incentive system for those who acquire qualifications including those not related to their work.

  Proactive participation of physically challenged people
  We proactively employ physically challenged people at our offices across Japan and have strengthened the support system for long-term employment in partnership with an external employment support company.

  LGBT
  We have a rule that prohibits discrimination against LGBT people and promote understanding through new manager training.

Hand in Hand with Customers

Nihon Parkerizing continues to provide high-quality products and products with less environmental impact from the customers' viewpoint to satisfy them.

Quality assurance organization

Before April 2018, we had the Quality Assurance Department under the Technology Headquarters on the same level as the research and development and manufacturing departments. However, in April 2018, the Quality Assurance Department became the Quality Assurance Division to strengthen the quality assurance system across the company as independent agency.
The Quality Assurance Division aims to strengthen our quality assurance system, for example, through quality audits in domestic and overseas affiliates and in Nihon Parkerizing and education on quality to provide products and services that customers rely on feeling satisfied with based on customer-centricity.

Simplified diagram of
our quality assurance system

Our quality activities

Compliance & Quality Awareness Month
Here, we introduce Compliance & Quality Awareness Month, which started in 2019, as an example of quality activities. The purpose of this awareness month is to find and prevent risks related to matters such as compliance, work safety, environment, and quality at the workplace as early as possible.

Implementation

Implementation	Every December	Prepare in November, which is National Quality Month.
	January	Report implementation results

RMS activities (domestic manufacturing factories)
We started RMS activities in 2012 to strengthen the system and improve onsite capabilities in the manufacturing department in the wake of product complaints and industrial accidents at domestic manufacturing factories.
We have expanded these activities to the treatment department.

What is a risk management system (RMS)?

We identify risks related to quality, safety, and environment in work and evaluate (score) them according to criteria.
We make improvements and take preventive measures for high-risk work (behavior) to lower the risk and then re-evaluate it.
We aim to raise sensitivity to notice danger, enhance communication, enhance our ability to think and improve our powers of expression through these activities to strengthen onsite capabilities.

1. Small group activities
   Every employee conducts improvement activities with several members such as the manufacturing group, quality control group, operations group, maintenance group, and logistics group.
   Group members get together for about 30 to 60 minutes several times a month, which leads to communication enhancement across groups.
   Example of risk identification and action

   • 
     Electrical wiring on the floor could cause someone to fall or wire breakage.
   • 
     We hung a cord reel from the ceiling to improve the situation.
2. Debrief session in the factory
   Employees share the results of small group activities in their factory several times a year. Employees take this opportunity to spread effective initiatives to other groups.
3. National debrief session
   We held the second national debrief session in December 2020. Activities in each manufacturing factory were shared with many employees during this nationwide debrief session. Excellent actions were commended and honored.
   In addition to the manufacturing departments, the rust prevention and heat treatment departments participated in the second national debrief session. We plan to include more departments and our domestic group companies, overseas joint ventures, and other related companies in the future.

ISO9001

We have worked on obtaining certification since the establishment of the quality management system standards. Kansai Plant was certified in 1995 for the chemical business and Hiratsuka No.2 Plant was certified in 1997 for the treatment business. Now, all our factories are accredited for the chemical business and treatment business.

We have continued to improve to provide better products with customers based on the basic philosophy of ISO9001, that is, customer-centricity.

We are also establishing a system to meet global demand for quality for all our overseas affiliates to obtain ISO9001 certification.

Percentage of ISO9001-certified factories

• Nihon Parkerizing alone

  

  Total of 16 factories (5 product manufacturing factories and 11 treatment factories)

• Domestic consolidated subsidiaries

  

  Total of 10 factories (equipment manufacturing, chemical manufacturing, and treatment)

  * Certification status of 10 of our 13 domestic consolidated subsidiaries excluding Parker Giken Kogyo, Kyodoyuso, and Ozeki Chemical Industry, which are not involved in the above businesses (Two relevant companies are not yet certified.)

• Overseas consolidated subsidiaries

  

  Total of 17 factories (equipment manufacturing, chemical manufacturing, and treatment)

  * Certification status of our 17 main overseas consolidated subsidiaries
  (including IATF16949 certification. One relevant company is not yet certified.)

Management of chemical substances in products

To fulfill our social responsibility as a chemical manufacturer that manufactures and sells chemical products, we take various initiatives according to the Policies for Management of Chemical Substances in Products.

Policies for Management of Chemical Substances in Products

Standards for Management of Chemical Substances in Products

As a company that manufactures and sells chemical products, we have established the Standards for Management of Chemical Substances in Products and managed the chemical substances contained in our products.

Standards for Management of Chemical Substances in ProductsList of Prohibited and Controlled Packaging Substances

Hand in Hand with Business Partners

Nihon Parkerizing makes environmentally friendly procurement and builds good constructive relationships through fair and equal transactions with business partners.

Procurement

Procurement Policies
We promote sound transactions to mutually improve corporate value with business partners in line with our Procurement Policies.

Green procurement
We have created Green Procurement Guidelines and procured materials according to the guidelines.

Procurement-related request for business partners
Business partners are requested to comply with our Green Procurement Guidelines to manage and reduce risks associated with chemical substances that affect people and the environment throughout the supply chain.

Action against conflict minerals
We aim to use conflict-free materials and avoid conflict minerals from countries around Congo, which are involved in wrongful acts such as violation of human rights as raw materials. We intend to promote procurement activities that consider how raw materials that could cause social problems in human rights, the environment, etc., affect the local community.

Details

Hand in Hand with Employees

Nihon Parkerizing aims to become a company where every employee can actively and happily make the most of their potential.

Human resources development

According to the words of our founder, people are the basis of the business. We believe that human resources are precious assets that have priority over all other management resources. We provide many voluntary self-development training courses and training courses for each job rank to improve the abilities and skills of employees and provide financial incentives to those who acquire qualifications.

Educational system diagram

Creation of a healthy workplace

We put effort into the health management of employees to realize a comfortable workplace. As part of this management, we store the results of periodic health checkups in a database to prevent diseases and increase the severity of preexisting conditions. The mutual benefit society for employees has a subsidy system that covers the complete medical checkup cost for employees and their spouses and the flu vaccination cost for their family members to promote their health.
As mental health measures, the company provides stress checks, consultation with a company doctor or health nurse, and a support system so that employees and their family members can use the EAP service (employees support program) 24-7.

Stress checks and health checkups

We encourage all employees to receive health checkups to maintain and promote their health. Regarding mental health, we periodically conduct online stress checks for all employees to realize their stress levels and prevent mental disorders.

Efforts for proper working hours

We have established fair working conditions for employees with our company rules and salary rules, which provide working conditions including appropriate working hours, work breaks, overtime work, holiday work, salary, and other matters based on laws and regulations.
We are also attempting to reduce excessive working hours by distributing monthly working hours data to each division. In addition, we make sure to distribute this data to our domestic subsidiaries through opportunities such as the meeting of group company presidents and the executive manager meeting. Furthermore, we have a flextime system mainly in the administrative departments to establish a work environment where employees can balance work and family when raising children or nursing family members.

Prohibition against harassment

We have an internal whistleblowing system to prevent harassment such as power harassment, sexual harassment, and "maternity harassment" (harassment against mothers). We also educate employees to avoid each type of harassment through employee training such as new manager training.

Relationship with the labor union

The company has stable labor-management relations with the Nihon Parkerizing Labor Union, and we hold discussions and negotiations with them about employees' working conditions and other matters. Management maintains a labor-management meeting with union leaders every six months and discusses with personnel staff almost every month.

Support for work-life balance

We take new initiatives that lead to productivity enhancement and good work-life balance for employees to reform individual work styles and corporate culture.

Benefits program

We have a benefits program that supports employees at every life event to work for the company for a long time.

Life event map

Safety and health management

We have created the safety and health manual and repeated the PDCA cycle, for example, by setting goals, managing documentation, and conducting internal audits and management reviews to improve safety and health.

Safety and health education

We provide safety and health education when employing new workers.

Chemical substance risk assessment

We have built a system to assess risks by entering information on the harmful effects of chemical substances used during work and parameters such as the work environment.
We conduct a chemical substance risk assessment using this system and announce the result throughout the workplace.

Safety and health risk assessment

We conduct a risk assessment for hazardous tasks, etc., and take measures against them to prevent major accidents.
This risk assessment is provided in the safety and health manual and is being exercised

Efforts of the Safety and Health Committee

Under the Industrial Safety and Health Act, we hold the Safety and Health Committee at each office every month. The committee investigates and discusses preventive measures against industrial accidents and health problems and health promotion and risk assessment matters.

Central Safety and Health Environment Committee

We hold the Central Safety and Health Environment Committee as an ISO14001 management review twice a year. Related parties such as the management, the executive offices of the labor union, and the environmental safety department members attend the committee and discuss many different issues.

Occupational accident frequency rate and occupational accident severity rate

The occupational accident frequency rate and occupational accident severity rate have been on the increase for the past three years. In particular, the occupational accident severity rate increased because of an industrial accident associated with lost work time. We will decrease these rates by conducting risk assessments and other measures to stimulate companywide safety and health activities and eliminate hazard sources. We will also continue to prioritize protecting the safety and health of everyone who works for our company and aim to create a comfortable workplace environment.

• Occupational accident frequency rate = (Number of casualties / Gross working hours) × 1,000,000

• Occupational accident severity rate = (Number of work-days lost / Gross working hours) × 1,000

Hand in Hand with Residents

Nihon Parkerizing proactively interacts with residents and contributes to communities.

We provide learning opportunities to children, forge the next generation, and interact with residents.

Interaction with junior high students in the Central Research Laboratories

• We invited students from a nearby elementary school from 2008 to 2012. They enjoyed learning chemistry through experiments, such as rust prevention treatment, hydrophilic treatment, cold forming, surface observation, chemical reactions (color change as a result of the reaction, pH-test paper, and color changes with visible patterns), three states of substance (freezing experiment using liquid nitrogen), etc.
• In June 2019, we invited students from a nearby junior high school and gave a lecture titled "Chemical Substances and Our Life" and showed them a surface treatment and analysis experiment.
  They experienced chemistry on why surface treatment is required, how surfaces are treated, what happens due to surface treatment, and microscope observation of various targets.

• *1
• *2
• *3

• *1) Written impressions
  I was glad that I visited Nihon Parkerizing. I didn't know what the company does before the visit, but I found that out and also learned some unexpected things. It was an excellent experience. Thank you for the valuable experience.
• *2) Written impressions
  They are great because they satisfy customers' needs and care about the environment, etc., at the same time. They taught us about chemistry with a smile. It made me think Nihon Parkerizing is a good company.
• *3) Written impressions
  Nihon Parkerizing is close to my home, but I didn't know what they do. It was a good experience. Their explanation was thorough and easy to understand. Thank you very much.

Aside from these, we work on local revitalization with residents through regular cleaning activities around our premises, tree plantation in factories, and participation in local events.