Dow endorses Responsible Care Global Charter and Global Product Strategy
On January 16, 2006 Dow recommitted its support to Responsible Care® when Andrew Liveris, CEO and chairman-elect, signed the Responsible Care Global Charter (421KB PDF), a document that goes beyond the original elements of Responsible Care to consider evolving challenges for the chemical industry. Dow also endorsed the Global Product Strategy, an effort by the global chemical industry to further improve its product stewardship efforts.
Global Charter Reaffirms Dow Support
Dow participated in the development of the Responsible Care Global Charter under the auspices of the International Council of Chemical Associations (ICCA). In signing the Global Charter, Andrew Liveris reaffirmed Dow’s commitment to adhering to the vision and ethics of Responsible Care on a global scale. More then 75 CEOs of chemical companies and industry associations have reaffirmed their support of its guiding principles.
Responsible Care is the global chemical industry’s environmental, health and safety (EH&S) initiative to drive continuous improvement in performance. It achieves this objective by meeting and going beyond legislative and regulatory compliance, and by adopting cooperative and voluntary initiatives with government and other stakeholders.
“Responsible Care is an ethic and a commitment that seeks to build confidence and trust in an industry that is essential to improving living standards and the quality of life,” says Andrew. “Since being a founding member of Responsible Care in the 1980s, Dow has actively practiced and promoted its principles and we strongly support the Global Charter.”
“The Responsible Care Global Charter arose from an examination of chemical industry practices and performance that has evolved since the mid-1980s,” says Larry Washington, corporate vice president, Sustainability and EH&S. “This Global Charter goes beyond the original elements of Responsible Care and focuses on new and important challenges facing the chemical industry and global society.”
The Charter addresses topics such as the growing public dialogue over sustainable development, public health issues related to the use of chemical products, the need for greater industry transparency, and the opportunity to achieve greater harmonization and consistency among various national Responsible Care programs.
Global Product Strategy
As an extension of the Responsible Care Global Charter’s emphasis on product stewardship, the International Council of Chemical Associations (ICCA) developed a Global Product Strategy. Dow has been actively involved in the development of this strategy which guides the industry’s long-term efforts to meet the global challenges to chemical products.
The Global Product Strategy includes the development of guidelines for product stewardship; a tiered process for risk characterization and management; focus on downstream industry customers; exploration of intergovernmental organization partnerships; and greater transparency in product stewardship information.
The Global Products Strategy was approved by the ICCA Board at its October 2005 meeting, and work to implement the strategy is currently underway.
The Responsible Care Global Charter and the Global Products Strategy were launched on February 5, 2006 at the United Nations International Conference on Chemicals Management in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. For more information, go to www.icca-at-dubai.org.
For additional Dow information visit:
Product Safety
For additional external resources visit:
http://www.responsiblecare.org/
