When words mean more than actions

Julian Kirby

02 August 2013

Last week half the world's top ten smartphone makers admitted their products are highly likely to contain tin mined in environmentally and socially devastating conditions on Indonesia's Bangka Island.

This followed eight months of international pressure from Friends of the Earth's Make It Better campaign for smartphone megabrands to confirm whether they use tin from Bangka and neighbouring Belitung. And if so, to commit to using their influence to help improve the situation there.

Tracking tin through the supply chain

Our research identified how the tin makes its way through refiners and solder makers into components for gadgets, but since a third of the world's freshly mined tin comes from these islands it's pretty much a no-brainer the tin's in their products.

To paraphrase one of the companies we spoke to, any of the major brands would find it hard not to admit using Bangka's tin.

Now Nokia, LG Electronics, Motorola Mobility, Sony and Blackberry have issued public statements answering our questions. They join smartphone leader Samsung and Dutch electronics giant Philips, which led the pack by responding to public pressure months ago.

Leaving off for a moment who's left, this demonstrates an important principle: companies should be straight with customers about what it takes to make their products. Not to 'educate the consumer'- people don't have time to read more complicated labelling - but to demonstrate manufacturers will take responsibility for the impacts of their operations on people and planet.

A new era of responsible business?

The days when the dodgy - to put it mildly - deeds happening at the obscure upper reaches of public-facing brands' supply chains are dismissed as someone else's responsibility are ending.

The wreckage of Bangka's tin mines, the living-hell of the DRC's conflict minerals, the cotton farm slavery of Uzbekistan - none of these belong in the 21st Century economy.

To be fair a great many companies get this and are immensely keen to know where their raw materials come from so they can be sure their procurement habits aren't contributing to anything nasty.

Many are also exploring what's known by sustainability egg-heads as circular business models. That means redesigning products and marketing to ensure goods and materials stay in use as long as possible. This in turn reduces the need for, and inevitable cost of, extracting fresh raw materials.

Legislate for change

Proper supply chain analysis helps businesses both through revealing bad practice and providing the information necessary to perfect those circular business models.

At the moment it can be hard to come by this information but new European legislation, if we get it right, will help. That's why leading NGOs are calling for strong non-financial reporting laws. Big business groups, like the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) want them too.

But getting technicalities like new legislation right begins with public conversation around fundamental principles like transparency. By being straight with customers about the impacts of making smartphones, Nokia et al have made a plucky, important contribution.

Rotten Apple?

So who's missing? Apart from a struggling HTC, plus Huawei and ZTE, not major brands in the West, only Apple still refuses to admit it uses tin from Bangka.

Apple's argument is that driving and part-funding an industry group to look into the problems and possible solutions to Bangka's woes is action enough, and serves as an "implicit" admission of its use of Bangka tin.

Really?

Apple's acting like a well-heeled addict that sets up a clinic and invites others to join it in therapy. They all sit in a circle and one by one bravely announce their names and admit to their struggles:

"My name's Nokia and I have a problem".

"My name's Sony and I have a problem".

And so on around the room.

Until

"My name's Apple ... and there is a problem".

Not quite the same is it?

Hardly matches CEO Tim Cook's commitment to be more open about Apple's supply chains either..

Sometimes words are worth more than actions, because publicly admitting something is a sign you have the courage and commitment to do something about it, to change.

Julian Kirby
Make It Better