Commitment is an act

Audi is a member of the Aluminium Stewardship Initiative (ASI). ASI’s mission is to recognise and collaboratively foster the responsible production, sourcing and stewardship of aluminium.

Audi has been an active member of the Global Battery Alliance since 2017. This organization advocates the protection of human rights and social standards in the mining of raw materials used in batteries and develops solutions for recycling lithium-ion batteries.

In order to eliminate human rights violations in our own supply chain, we are also planning to audit the sustainability performance of the mines in our supply chain in the medium term. With that in mind, Volkswagen joined the CERA project (Certification of Raw Materials), which is committed to developing sustainability standards for mines, at the beginning of 2019.

AUDI AG has set itself the goal of further increasing transparency and traceability in the supply chain also by using new technologies. For this reason, we are piloting the use of blockchain technologies, artificial intelligence, and other innovations in our global, complex supply chains. This will enable us to gain a better insight into the origin of cobalt, which is used in lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles, for example. The origin of other minerals used in vehicle production can also be traced in this way. The responsible procurement of raw materials is of fundamental importance for enabling sustainable mobility. The pilot projects mark the start of extensive developments to create more transparency and security in the supply chain.

AUDI AG is playing an active part in the “Sector dialog of the automotive industry on respecting human rights along the global supply and value chains” initiated by the German Federal Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs (BMAS). Solutions are being developed together with other stakeholders to improve compliance with human rights along the global supply and value chains in the German automotive industry. These will deal with risks in raw material supply chains and cross-company grievance mechanisms, for example.

As part of the industry’s Drive Sustainability initiative under the umbrella of CSR Europe, Volkswagen is working on the continual analysis of sustainability risks in the raw materials sector, from which it is deriving individual as well as joint measures with other automotive manufacturers. The development of a common questionnaire standard for reviewing sustainability aspects a suppliers is also a key focus of the initiative.