The Compliance Committee
The Takasago Group believes that compliance is one of its top priority management issues and strives to continuously improve its compliance system while ensuring fair and proper business activities and effective corporate governance. The Compliance Committee is chaired by the President and includes full-time directors and full-time corporate auditors. The Compliance Committee deliberates and promotes the establishment and thoroughness of a compliance system, ensuring legal compliance in accordance with the Corporate Charter and Code of Conduct.
Commitment to Ethical Business Practices
Takasago International Corporation Group supports the purpose of the Council for Promoting Partnership Building for the Future, an initiative promoted by the Japanese government, and has announced its participation in the Declaration of Partnership Building.
The Declaration of Partnership Building is a Japanese government-led initiative where companies, regardless of their size, declare their own transaction policies from the standpoint of "ordering parties." The initiative aims to foster coexistence and co-prosperity throughout the supply chain and encourage new collaborations between large corporations and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Companies publicly commit to these principles under the name of their representatives.
In line with our Vision 2040 of being "People-friendly, Environment-friendly," Takasago International Corporation strives to enhance added value across the entire supply chain and is committed to maintaining strong partnerships with its business partners.
Compliance Hotline
The Takasago Group has a compliance hotline that enables all employees and other stakeholders such as suppliers and customers to report any compliance issues through the hotline and all of the information submitted to the hotline will be treated in the strictest confidence. Posters advertising the hotline have been displayed at offices and factories to ensure that our stakeholders know how to report any issues they discover. We report the number of consultations on our Sustainability Report.
Commitment to Competition Laws
In order to conduct ethical business activities, the Takasago International Group complies with the competition laws of each country, including Japan's Antitrust Law. We also conduct employee training on fair competition practices.
Approach to Anti-Bribery
The Takasago Group understands that corporate bribery is an impediment to fair competition and a serious threat to corporate credibility. Based on this, we have established the Takasago Group Anti-Bribery Policy to ensure fair and ethical business activities by preventing bribery involving the employees or officers of the Takasago Group companies, ensuring compliance with the bribery laws and regulations of the countries and regions where we do business prohibiting bribery without exception.
The Takasago Group Anti-Bribery Policy stipulates the implementation of education and training and the establishment of a consultation and reporting system.
Approach to Eliminating Organized Crime
Our position against organized crime is clearly stated in our Charter of Corporate Behavior and Code of Conduct as well as The Takasago Group Supplier Code of Conduct. We work to eliminate organized crime by encouraging the entire group and also our supply chain. Furthermore, in response to the Tokyo Metropolitan Government’s policy of eliminating organized crime groups, we have included a clause regarding the elimination of organized crime into our basic transaction contracts.
Tax Compliance Initiatives
The Takasago Group recognizes that the payment of taxes is one of the most basic and important social responsibilities that companies must fulfill, and we believe that proper tax payment plays an important role in the development of the countries and regions where we do business.
- We do not engage in tax planning or use tax havens to avoid taxes, and we comply with the laws and regulations of each country and region and the guidelines set forth by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
- We have established a scheme to enhance tax compliance and reduce tax risks by securing and training appropriate human resources while strengthening cooperation with external experts and other departments. In addition, we comply with laws and regulations and strengthen risk management by sharing the information about legal judgements and lawsuits that the tax authorities of various countries and regions provide.
- We build and maintain good relationships with tax authorities in each country and region and respond to their requests in good faith. In addition, we strive to ensure transparency and trust in the tax authorities of each country and region by appropriately disclosing the information required by applicable laws and
regulations.
Ethical Audits
To operate our business sustainably, we need to understand our own business practices, enhance our business ethics and ensure that we comply with the principles of social responsibility. Our group utilizes SMETA* to conduct ethical audits by third party organizations at our own manufacture sites. Through SMETA, we properly confirm compliance of our sites and strive to improve in accordance with audit results and findings.
Takasago Group plans to undergo SMETA audits regularly on a global scale and conducts SMETA assessments at all major manufacturing sites. SMETA is based on the ETI Base Code, established by the International Labour Organization (ILO), and evaluates the following criteria.
[Major SMETA issues]
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All issues found in these audits have been corrected and addressed. We will continue to implement SMETA to build an ethical corporate culture.
* SMETA (Sedex Members Ethical Trade Audit) is Sedex’s social auditing methodology, and the most widely used social audit in the world. SMETA assesses a site based on 4 pillars: labour, health and safety, environment and business ethics.
In addition to the ethical audits, we review our compliance through Ecovadis questionnaires. For example, as one of questions, we confirmed that employees receive 24 hours rest within a time frame of 7 consecutive days throughout the entire scope of operations.