Keurig hosts March AIM-PROGRESS membership meeting

The Burlington meeting held in March was the first of the three annual AIM-PROGRESS meetings that enable members to meet face to face, exchange best practices and involve themselves in the work streams.

 

Mutual recognition- The focus of the membership meeting discussions was the on-going work on converging the ever-broadening supplier audit expectations of leading brands to continue to enable Mutual Recognition of audits, a key USP for AIM-PROGRESS.

 

Capability building- Professionalising member and supplier capability building, through an easy-to-use learning platform to enable capability self-assessment, continuous development of responsible sourcing programmes and use of a shared resource of member companies’ learning tools, is another of AIM-PROGRESS’ key deliverables. 

 

Human rights- Members’ ability to deploy the UNGP on business and human rights as the umbrella for their responsible supply chain approach will be greatly helped by the new UNGP training deck developed by AIM-PROGRESS for its members. One particular point for future debate is in how far a sector can implement joint remedy/ grievance mechanisms for workers in its supply chain, a debate undertaken in collaboration with Shift.

 

Impact measurement - To see whether and how we are actually improving workers’ lives is another of the ongoing key projects. A set of KPIs has been identified and sources for the necessary measurement data are currently being tested. AIM-PROGRESS will collaborate with Sedex on this topic.

 

Oxfam presentation- As at every meeting, speakers from other stakeholder groups were invited to present: Oxfam gave a sneak preview of their upcoming, and now published, Behind the Brands scorecard update and future focus areas of their work. It was heartening to see that AIM-PROGRESS members’ efforts in responsible sourcing were translating into improved scores. 

 

APSCA – The Association of Professional Compliance Auditors presented their mission to “enhance the professionalism and credibility of the individuals and organisations performing independent social compliance audits” – a crucial element against the background of evolving audit requirements.

 

Coffee technology specialist Keurig opened their Burlington headquarters to AIM-PROGRESS members. Keurig co-founder Dick Sweeney delivered an inspiring account of how persistence to implement new ideas and preparedness to take risks can lead to a revolution in coffee consumption – in the shape of the single-cup coffee brewing system.

 

“Fantastic interactions and sharing of practicalities on how work was done and achieved - very useful talk about ‘maturity’”

“Very informative and interactive presentations on relevant topics, leading to deep discussions on the progression of members’ programs and how limited resources are handled.”

“Feeling that the debate brands versus suppliers has reached a very high and quality level.”

“Willingness and openness of members to share”

“Actual concrete improvements in work streams”

 

The material from the Burlington meeting can be accessed in the member zone under “AIM-PROGRESS Meetings”.

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