Introduction
Apple is among the leading companies in the world in terms of innovation and technological advancement. The company’s market has grown immensely, up to $1 Trillion, as per the records of September 2019. Since 2014, the company has made tremendous progress in its CSR and sustainability, ranging from its supply chain, manufacturing, reduction of environmental footprint, production of safer products, amongst others (Khan et al.,2015). The company has positioned itself together with its suppliers and manufacturers at the highest standards, to ensure that everybody is subjected to dignified and respectful treatment, hence bringing to it great results. The company has achieved the following milestones in its CSR since 2014.
- Supplier responsibility
- a) Safe and respectful working places for all
Apple has set guidelines to its suppliers, requiring them to handle their employees with respect and dignity. The suppliers must provide a safe working area, fair working hours, and a discrimination-free environment to all its employees (Chen,2018). The suppliers must provide necessary safety equipment, protocol and the appropriate training for the employees on the local labor law requirements and the human rights protection as stipulated in the Supplier Code of Conduct to aid in risk management in the workplace. Moreover, they must inform all their employees about these rights from the start, while guaranteeing the correct channels for voicing complaints if any arise(Mogensen, 2018).
- b) The use of renewable resources
The company has greatly achieved in the use of renewable energy for its operations since its announcement of a Supplier Clean Energy Program in 2015. By the beginning of 2018, Apple had already completely attained its goal of entirely using 100% of renewable electricity for all its operations. Since its suppliers produce a large part of carbon emissions generated by the Apple system, the company has included its suppliers in its program of using 100% renewable energy for their operations, while helping them to reduce their energy use (Chen,2018). This has been achieved by closely partnering with their suppliers and assessing them at all points in their global supply chain. In 2018, the company, together with its suppliers, invested in 1.9 gigawatts of operating clean energy, which wholesomely generated 4.1 billion kWh, thereby helping the company to avoid the production of about 3.5 million metric tons of CO2. This has greatly helped the company to grow the impact of its CSR and sustainability.
2.Water Stewardship
The company has made significant steps in the area of water stewardship, including control of freshwater use, improving the quality of water discharged from its system, and protecting its water resources. Apple’s major focus on improving the use of water in its facilities via its Clean Water Program is to assist its suppliers in conserving water and prevention of water pollution (Mogensen, 2018). The company has equally engaged the local communities in the regions where it does its operations like manufacturing of products, to ensure that they access and protect the shared water resources.
Moreover, the company has also designed its new data centers to consume less amount of water for cooling purposes. This is to further assist the company in conserving more water and protect the available resources to ensure continuous water supply. Water recycling is another area that the company has improved as most of its facilities have adopted the use of recycled water. Lastly, Apple has pursued the alternative sources of water for its suppliers through the conservation of rainwater, and this has helped the company manage water scarcity, enhance continuous water supply for all its projects as well as the reduction of pressure on the available sources of water (Mogensen, 2018).
3.Recycling
Apple has made significant achievements in the use of recycled materials. The company has launched the use of recycled aluminum, tin and cobalt for its products. It has partnered with academicians and experts in the expansion of its innovation in the area of recycling and disassembly. The company is entirely using recycled tin in the solder on the major logic boards for 111 of its products. In 2018, the company launched its MacBook Air and Mac Mini with completely recycled aluminum enclosures, which have assisted the company in reducing the carbon footprint of these products by a half( Vonk, 2018). Furthermore, the company has introduced 82 components, with around 38% of recycled plastics across all these products, which were released in 2018. Lastly, the company has refurbished about 8 million devices and recycled around 50000 metric tonnes of e-waste in the year 2018.
4.Manufacturing of safer products
Apple has adopted robust measures to ensure the safety of its products to both its manufacturers and consumers. The company has updated its Regulated Substances Specification to strengthen its supplier requirements and restrictions on dangerous substances. All the company’s supplier final assembly points have also fully adopted the use of degreasers and safe cleaners (Bumblauskas,2017).
References
Chen, S. (2018). Multinational corporate power, influence, and responsibility in global supply chains. Journal of Business Ethics, 148(2), 365-374.
Khan, U. A., Alam, M. N., & Alam, S. (2015). A critical analysis of the internal and external environment of Apple Inc. International Journal of Economics, Commerce and Management, 3(6), 955-961.
Mogensen, B. G. (2018). Managing Corporate Legitimacy Through CSR Reporting: A Qualitative Case Study of Apple Inc.’s Supplier Responsibility Reports (Master’s thesis).
Bumblauskas, D. P. (2017). Sustainable operations management and benchmarking in brewing: A factor weighting approach. Journal of Operations and Supply Chain Management, 10(1), 55-67.
Vonk, L. (2018). Will Liam save us?: an analysis of Apple’s zero-waste goals and waste networks associated with the MacBook: a thesis presented in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Media Studies at Massey University, Manawatū, New Zealand (Doctoral dissertation, Massey University).