Photo: IBM
In a story in The New York Times on Wednesday, I write about IBM’s new initiative to green up its $40 billion global supply chain:
I.B.M. said on Wednesday that it will require its 28,000 suppliers in more than 90 countries to install management systems to gather data on their energy use, greenhouse gas emissions and waste and recycling.
Those companies in turn must ask their subcontractors to do the same if their products or services end up as a significant part of I.BM.’s $40 billion global supply chain. The suppliers must also set environmental goals and make public their progress in meeting those objectives.
“We will be amongst the first, if not the first, with these broad-based markers on our supply base and we’re going to have to spend an appropriate amount of time and money to help our suppliers do what we’re asking them to do,” John Patterson, vice president of I.B.M. global supply and chief procurement officer, said in a telephone interview from Hong Kong.
“It’s clear that there’s real financial benefits to be had for procurers across the world to get innovative with their suppliers,” Mr. Patterson added. “In the long term, as the Earth’s resources get consumed, prices are going to go up. We’ve already seen large price increases and problems with water.”
The initiative follows Wal-Mart’s announcement in February that it would require its suppliers to eliminate 20 million metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions from the lifecycle of the products it sells.
I.B.M., one of the world’s largest technology companies, is not setting numerical targets for its suppliers to achieve. Rather, the goal is to institutionalize data-gathering systems that will collect information on a variety of measures of environmental performance, according to Wayne Balta, the company’s vice president of corporate environmental affairs and product safety.
“Our overall interest is to systemize environmental management and sustainability across our global supply chain so it helps our suppliers build their own capacity in a way that’s not only good for the environment but their business,” said Mr. Balta. “It’s about creating a system that works regardless of who is in leadership and what’s in green vogue.”
You an read the rest of the story here.
Green Wombat 
“It’s about creating a system that works regardless of who is in leadership and what’s in green vogue.”
It is actually very smart. Create a system; force your suppliers to test it with you; prove that it has some merit. Then sell the snot out of said system to the rest of the world, thereby reaping huge profits!