Commitment is an act

Innovate and initiate
For example, our commitment to industry-wide initiatives, our focus on new, innovative technologies, and the use of relevant certificates and standards that help us convey and visualize our requirements play a key role here.

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.
Be real talk real
Internationally recognized guidelines and principles are the foundations and backbone of sustainability management at our company.
Volkswagen Group Policy on Sustainable Raw Materials
2 pages, EN
25.3 KB
Volkswagen Code of Conduct for Business Partners
44 pages, EN
2.9 MB
Sustainable Development Goals 2016
4 pages, EN
519.5 KB
Sustainability Report 2019
127 pages, EN
10.4 MB
Human Rights Policy of AUDI AG (German only)
1 page, DE
910.1 KB
The Code of Conduct for business partners
The Code of Conduct for business partners of the Volkswagen Group summarizes the expectations we place on our partners. We take well-founded indications of breaches of these requirements very seriously.
Do you know of any breaches by our business partners of the Code of Conduct or have you been directly impacted by any breaches?
Please contact us at
Report hints correctly

External points of contact
What’s more, indications of breaches of responsible business conduct within the meaning of the
OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises can be reported via the
German Federal Government’s National Contact Point or any other
National Contact Point for these guidelines.
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