Traceability has become the hot potato to address when engaging in a supply chain's sustainability journey. Businesses, NGOs, legislation... since 2020 everyone puts traceability on the pinnacle of their targets to achieve their sustainability goals; and rightfully so, but not always for the right reasons.
The 2013 Rhana Plaza shock was the moment of realization for the apparel sector that they were no different from other commodity-based industries. The ripple effect came into motion in 2017 when the OECD published its first OECD Due Diligence Guidance for Responsible Supply Chains in the Garment and Footwear Sector after 2 years of arduous work. The apparel, homeware and footwear sectors discovered slowly but surely that the supply chains on which they relied to manufacture their desirable products were at risk of adversely affecting people and the environment. But in the globalized world that is ours, where competitive advantage and social dumping have led to highly complex and distanced supply chains intended to serve markets conditioned to acquiring more than needed, cleaning the latter one-by-one felt unattainable. As matter of fact, IKEA discovered in a 2017 assessment that each manufactured leather product could potentially originate from a pool of 100,000 farms. Mind dazzling, right? What could companies, located at the end of their supply chains, do to act?
In fairness, only two solutions exist:
Start from a clean slate and set up responsible supply chains from scratch. Whilst accessible for newcomers, it would be an arduous task for settled businesses and disastrous for their supply chain partners.
Investigate each existing supply chain, assess risks then assure that practices are responsible; and if not, assist the latter in changing their practices to responsible ones or substitute the unresponsible actor by a responsible one. In very simplified terms, the approach suggested by the OECD for installed businesses.
So, where to start?
Well, it starts with knowing who it is you are actually dealing with. This does not necessarily mean its very identity and can be limited to knowing that the actors involved in the supply chain that manufacture your leather bag (the zip manufacturer, the leather tanner, the cotton grower for the liner, etc.) respect responsible practices*: this is the concept of chain of custody (CoC)*. But with new technology arizing and CoC systems still currently based on trust, CoC in whatever form - it being book and claim, mass balance, or segregation in soft or strong identity preserved - has been in some cases disregarded and replaced by either plain traceability*: the act of following upstream or investigating downstream one's supply chain, or proof of origin*: the capacity to assess the exact origin of the raw material(s) of which the product is - or in its opposite form the capacity to assure the non-origin of a product's raw material.
Why is this an issue?
Let's clear the air first: aiming for traceability is not an issue in itself. Traceability becomes an issue when it is considered sufficient by your business in ensuring that your supply chains are responsible.
Let's take an example: your business has committed to its very own sustainability journey. The target is to reach 100% of traceability and transparency for 5 of your iconic products by 2025. Fast forward a couple of months and the teams have proudly investigated the value chain and can trace your company's mohair-knitted sweater back to two South-African farmers: Jacqueline and John. You adopt the rules for transparency* and communicate to your customers with a home-made logo that you know through supply chain mapping involving blockchain technology where 100% of the mohair you source originates from.
Where lays the issue?
Putting aside the intricacies of robust traceability*, the issue lays in the fact that your business considers that knowing the who means that you also know the what. For what we know, Jacqueline and John might be spilling chemicals in a neighbouring creek, deforesting to increase pastureland, clandestinely employing illegal workers or castrate their young without proper medical support. Yet, your sustainability target of 100% of traceable mohair has been achieved, and your customers are serene when purchasing your product.
Traceability isn't the solution, it is one component
Traceability is one component of your sustainability journey, not the solution. Solving the sustainability puzzle with traceability alone is like solving a difficult question the answer to another question. Whilst this practice is extremely frustrating in politics, it can be devastating for people, animals and our environment, our One Health*. Yet, many companies' attraction to ending their sustainability endeavours at achieving traceability has been observed through and through, either due to limited understanding, or to limited capacity. Either way, reducing sustainability to traceability in company's activities and claims is greenwashing. So, let's avoid that.
How to return to traceability its well-deserved value?
Let's take a step back and dig into our wildest childhood dreams: who has never dreamt of becoming a detective? Now is your time to realize that dream and becone a true sustainability change-maker! In the same way a detective doesn't just follow the footprints, we, sustainability leaders, don't stop at the identity of our raw material supplier. The detective thoroughly scrutinizes the owner's motive and acts to either clear or indict them. The sustainability leader looks into the suppliers' practices.
In a nutshell
Setting up responsible supply chains requires meticulous work including stand-alone tools - that don't necessarily need to be new, but instead used for another purpose, and - that need to complemented with others.
Traceability is a means and not an end in itself: it needs to be coupled with responsible practices in the sense of a CoC for true sustainability.
This is why traceability and sustainability are complementary, yet substitutable.