BSCI Code of Conduct
SAAS has agreed to provide technical assistance
to the Business
Social Compliance Initiative (BSCI) as a means of promoting
workplace conditions in accordance with human rights, ILO
conventions and national labor law. BSCI is a program of
the Foreign Trade Association of Europe, designed to improve
working conditions at the suppliers of BSCI's participating
member companies.
The BSCI
program is designed to require: first, compliance with
selected elements in its code of conduct; then, in a stepwise
process, encouraging facilities to proceed to SA8000 certification.
The BSCI auditing system includes a gap analysis performed
by certification bodies
accredited to conduct SA8000
certification audits by SAAS. As recognition that BSCI auditing
must maintain a high quality, and to meet the demand for
continuous improvement, BSCI has contracted with SAAS to
conduct surveillance of BSCI audits to verify that BSCI
auditing protocols are being followed. This process is managed
through SAAS's accreditation
procedures.
The auditing measures provide better insight
into the audit quality and, at minimum, include a regular
schedule of SAAS surveillance of BSCI audits and implementation
process. SAAS is beginning the process of defining the appropriate
requirements for the audit process – although much
is similar to SA8000 certification audits, there are differences
in the audit protocols due to specific BSCI requirements
and the very nature of a gap analysis as compared with a
certification audit.
The BSCI system currently recognizes the
social management systems standard SA8000 as its best practice.
If a company has already been certified against the SA8000
standard, implementation of the BSCI Code of Conduct is
not requested as long as the SA8000 certificate is valid.
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