Our governance framework
By providing the foundation for our strategy and approach to leadership, good governance ultimately helps us fulfil our vision to make food safe and available, everywhere. Our governance framework helps us deliver on our brand promise and comply with relevant regulations and legislation, as well as guiding us to behave ethically and responsibly. A Global Leadership Team is responsible for implementing the framework, supported by a Corporate Governance Office and a network of local governance and risk officers.
Our charter of responsibility outlines the roles and responsibilities of the Tetra Laval Board and Tetra Pak. The framework also includes a comprehensive risk management methodology and system with related and mitigating policies, procedures and global processes for managing and responding to risks. To secure an effective and transparent internal control environment we have implemented a new Governance Risk Compliance (GRC) system. This creates a single platform for risk management, bringing mitigating policies, procedures and detailed controls together with assurance processes, assessments and reports.
While core values shape our corporate culture and guide our behaviour internally and externally, our Code of Business Conduct sets out the company’s position on working conditions, discrimination, confidentiality, conflicts of interest, financial reporting, compliance, corruption, bribery, child exploitation and environmental issues. We have established a Sustainability Forum to further support our strategic and cross-functional approach to sustainability. Reporting to the Strategy Council, its members are Vice-President and Director-level representatives from across the company.
Trust and transparency
To build trust and transparency with our customers and as part of our approach to responsible sourcing across our supply chain, we work with leading sustainability assessment platforms, including the Supplier Ethical Data Exchange (Sedex), EcoVadis and CDP.
In 2019, we were included on CDP's prestigious "A list" for both Climate and Forests. We were one of only 179 companies so recognised for our actions to cut emissions, mitigate climate risks and develop the low-carbon economy, and one of just eight for our work to prevent deforestation in supply chains. We were also rated by EcoVadis in the top one percent of companies in our industry category.
Communicating about our responsible business practices and performance is very important to us. We have been publishing environmental reports since 1999, and we have been reporting on broader sustainability issues since 2005.
Global principles
As signatories to the United Nations Global Compact (UNGC) we are committed to the implementation, disclosure and promotion of its 10 principles on human rights, labour, the environment and anti-corruption. We submit an annual Communication on Progress and also actively contribute to the UN and best practice standards of the Forest Stewardship Council™ (FSC™), World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), UN World Food Programme (WFP) and the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition.
Read more about our stakeholder engagement
Corruption: zero tolerance
Anti-corruption is an important part of our corporate governance and we take a zero-tolerance approach to corruption, bribery and fraud. Corruption is unethical; it undermines the fairness of the market, distorts transaction costs, destroys an open, honest and decent society and harms economic, social and political progress. Combating corruption is an important part of building trust with customers, suppliers and other stakeholders and fostering a responsible, transparent business culture.
Awareness, understanding and compliance
All employees, at all levels of the company, are responsible for complying with the governance framework in their everyday decisions and actions. Details of the framework are available on our intranet and a mandatory eLearning programme is in place.
Whistle-blowing
Anyone in the company can anonymously report actual or suspected breaches of our Code of Business Conduct or any other unethical behaviour directly to either the Corporate Governance Officer or Head of Audit, without being penalised in any way. Every case of a breach of our Code of Conduct is handled individually and investigated appropriately, depending on its severity. If the incident is criminal, we report it to the relevant authority.
