SocialWorking Together with Business Partners

Nihon Parkerizing aims to achieve environmental and social sustainability through our businesses under our corporate philosophy of “contributing to the preservation of the global environment and creation of an affluent society by creating new value from resources through surface modification of all kinds of materials, to make effective use of limited resources on planet Earth.”

To fulfill our social responsibilities under this philosophy, we provide our customers with safe and secure chemical raw materials. We aim to mutually enhance our corporate value by promoting sound procurement activities with our suppliers through legal compliance, respect for human rights, and fair trade. We strive for a sustainable procurement policy with our business partners under the following Policies.

Procurement Policy

1. The Nihon Parkerizing Group aims to realize coexistence and co-prosperity with suppliers based on mutual trust.
2. The Nihon Parkerizing Group will provide opportunities for procurement transactions to all suppliers and select them fairly and honestly, considering quality, price, delivery time, and other factors.
3. The Nihon Parkerizing Group will comply with domestic and foreign laws, regulations, and social norms and request that its suppliers comply with the same laws and regulations.
4. The Nihon Parkerizing Group is committed to sustainable procurement activities, fully considering the environment, human rights, occupational.

For Sustainable Procurement

When we procure new raw materials, we confirm that they meet our requirements for development and are safe and reliable.
When starting transactions, we prioritize companies that fulfill the following conditions. We also prioritize these companies in continuous transactions. In addition, to ensure quality, we sign quality assurance contracts with our existing business partners and inspect them with respect to chemical management and chemical substances contained in their products, among other matters, thereby confirming supplier performance.

1. The company must be in sound business condition.
2. Compliance with laws, regulations, social norms, and the like and consideration for human rights and the environment.
3. The quality, prices, and delivery dates of products from the suppliers are appropriate.
4. Suppliers have a stable supply and can respond to supply and demand risks.
5. Ability to achieve supply continuity through BCP measures.

Based on the above principles, we request the following information from our suppliers to achieve “sustainable procurement”.
Information about;

1. Delivery specifications
2. Quality control
3. Business partner
4. Supply-demand risks
5. Legal compliance and international codes of conduct
6. Raw materials purchased
7. Chemical compliance
8. Conflict minerals (response to conflict minerals)^*1
9. Elimination of antisocial forces^*2
10. Green procurement^*3

Do not hesitate to contact our Purchasing Group for inquiries about the formats of the above documents to be submitted.

Relationships with Suppliers

1. Process of selecting suppliers
   Before starting a new transaction, we examine whether the potential supplier meets our supply stability and quality control requirements and decide whether we can do business with them.
2. Supplier risk assessment
   We are committed to sharing cases of non-conforming products with our suppliers and taking corrective actions t after starting business with them. Non-conforming products are defined as follows.
   • Non-conformity caused by raw materials (suppliers’ products) that may cause severe defects in the quality or performance of our products.
   • Non-conformance products are unacceptable due to problems during acceptance inspection at our manufacturing plant.
   In the event of non-conforming products, our responsible departments (quality assurance and procurement department) will request the supplier to take corrective actions, promptly correct the problem, and identify the cause using a corrective action report (5Why Analysis Sheet). We conduct audits if necessary after corrective measures are taken to prevent recurrence.
3. Supplier audit
   We conduct audits according to self-diagnosis forms submitted in advance by suppliers who are considered to require audits to ensure quality and supply stability based on our quality management system initiatives. In addition, once every two years, we conduct “supply risk surveys” of all suppliers. Through the surveys, we collect information necessary for stable procurement, such as manufacturing sites and product storage. In addition, in the event of a natural disaster, fire, or equipment failure that interferes with a supplier's production activities and raises procurement concerns, we conduct spot surveys to identify and resolve the problem quickly.
4. Supplier communication and education
   We distribute a monthly "Procurement Brief" to all suppliers. We strive to maintain and improve quality by sharing information on cases of non-conformity in our company to reduce risks, communicating essential matters, and posting information on various issues related to chemical substances. We also notify our suppliers before periodic inspections to ensure they understand our initiatives.

Supplier engagement

In FY2022, we conducted a questionnaire to deepen mutual understanding with our suppliers. We aimed to confirm the status of suppliers’ sustainability initiatives, including procuring “sustainable palm oil with an awareness of human rights”, consideration for water use and biodiversity, assessing environment-related risks such as soil and air pollution, and efforts toward carbon neutrality. We received responses from more than 80% of suppliers.

We will continue to deepen our relationship with suppliers through dialogue on their sustainable procurement policies and the status of their initiatives. We will pursue initiatives aimed at achieving mutual understanding and bolstering corporate value.

Announcement of the Declaration of Partnership Building

Supporting the intent of the Council on Promoting Partnership Building for Cultivating the Future promoted by the Cabinet Office and the Small and Medium Enterprise Agency, Nihon Parkerizing has announced the “Declaration of Partnership Building”.

Nihon Parkerizing aims to build new partnerships by promoting collaboration, coexistence and shared prosperity with business partners in its supply chain and business operators who seek to create value.

Contact for inquiries and submission of documents

Materials Group, Manufacturing Department, Engineering Division, Nihon Parkerizing Co., Ltd.
16-8 Nihonbashi 2Chome, Chuo-ku, Tokyo, 103-0027, Japan
TEL: +81-3-3278-4325
E-mail address of the Materials Group: eco_koubai@parker.jp