The Hodogaya Chemical Group believes that respect for human rights as stipulated in the Constitution of Japan is a fundamental matter in carrying out its business activities. Identifying respect for human rights in our Sustainability Policy, we comply with laws and regulations as well as highly ethical and normed behavior, respect the diversity, personality, and individuality of everyone working at the Hodogaya Chemical Group, and ensure a sound and pleasant working environment free of discrimination and harassment, while also paying close attention to respect for human rights regarding partner companies in accordance with the Corporate Action Guidelines and the Compliance Action Policy, which include items described in the United Nations “Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.
The Hodogaya Chemical Group formulated the Human Rights Policy as part of its Sustainability Policy.
The Hodogaya Chemical Group regards respect for human rights as the basis of its business activities and ensures the following listed items in accordance with the Corporate Action Guidelines, Compliance Action Policy, and Procurement Policy, while also paying close attention to respect for human rights regarding partner companies.
The Hodogaya Chemical Group identifies human rights risks that may arise through its operations.
We are conducting education and training, upgrading workplace environments and systems, and engaging in supply chain management to address human rights risks and as preventative measures against identified risks.
We also closely monitor these activities to ascertain the effectiveness of preventive measures and to promote improvements on a continuous basis. We regularly conduct surveys of partner companies using the Procurement Guidelines Implementation Status Survey Sheet as part of efforts to monitor the supply chain and to confirm whether compliance items are properly implemented. In addition, we work to improve activities to deepen mutual understanding while building mutual trust with our partner companies.
A grievance mechanism is in place to detect and address risks related to human rights
We ensure a workplace environment that values human rights by continuing to explain the UN’s Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights and providing education on preventing harassment and consultation windows every year as a part of our compliance training, which applies to all executives and employees.
This training includes education on the need for corporate activities for human rights and the effects that human-rights initiatives have on business activities.
“The effects that human-rights initiatives have on business activities” includes education on the positive effects on human rights resulting from sufficient initiatives, as well as the and negative effects resulting from insufficient initiatives, with examples of what can happen if the initiatives are insufficient. The need for corporate activities for human rights is also covered.
The Corporate Action Guidelines clearly includes respect for the character and individuality of employees, and our basic stance in our Compliance Action Policy clearly includes respect for human rights and the prohibition of discrimination. With these policies, we refuse to accept forced labor and child labor within the Hodogaya Chemical Group.
We established a Human Resources Management Policy for hiring, assigning, transferring, educating, training, and evaluating employees as a part of a discrimination-free human resource system.
We have created a system that comprehensively prevents all types of harassment that infringe on human rights, including power harassment, sexual harassment, maternity harassment, and childcare/nursing care leave harassment. We have included clear harassment prohibitions in our Corporate Policy and Employment Regulations, and in line with our Harassment Prevention Regulations and manual, we have established a consultation window and taken other measures.
We are actively working to create systems for employee health and safety that promote health management and a work-life balance. For details, see the human resources page.
Also, we believe that handling personal information in a suitable manner is an important policy for respecting human rights. In order to act as an organization, we established and released our Policy on the Protection of Personal Information in addition to the Personal Information Management Rules, the Designated Personal Information Management Rules, and the Health Information Management Rules. We comply with laws and regulations on the handling of personal information, personal numbers, and health information, and we encourage the suitable retainment, use, and management of personal information within the scope of use stipulated by the policies and rules.
Additionally, in order to protect personal data in the EU and other European economic areas, we are compliant with the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).
Thanks to these activities, we reported in a management meeting that again in FY2022 Hodogaya Chemical Group did not have any issues regarding human-rights abuses.
We established a Procurement Policy and Procurement Guidelines, and basic contracts with business partners include compliance with the Procurement Guidelines as a requirement. We request business partners to understand the guidelines and take actions against human rights problems similarly to the Hodogaya Chemical Group.
The Procurement Guidelines include items for human rights and labor compliance such as: prohibiting forced labor, prohibiting inhumane treatment, prohibiting child labor, prohibiting discrimination, providing suitable wages, and work hours. We use this policy to prohibit forced labor and child labor within the supply chain.
We regularly survey business partners whose transactions exceed a certain amount with the Procurement Guidelines Implementation Status Survey Sheet to confirm whether the compliance items listed in the Procurement Guidelines are being properly implemented. In FY2022, all business partners that responded were compliant.
The Hodogaya Chemical Group does not handle conflict minerals (minerals that are mined in conflict zones in Africa, etc., and that are a source of resources for armed forces), i.e., tin, tantalum, tungsten, and gold.
We established an internal reporting window based on our internal reporting system. There was one report in FY2022.
Business partners and customers should use the “other inquires” form on the website.