Ethical sourcing is the process which ensures that the products being sourced are acquired in a responsible and sustainable way.

Ethical sourcing is required to ensure that the workers involved in making of all products are safe and treated fairly. The process of ethical sourcing is also responsible for environmental and social impacts of the production of goods.

Ethical sourcing practices:

•    69% are eliminating discrimination in the workplace;

•    63% are making efforts to uphold environmental responsibility;

•    57% are monitoring labour conditions;

•    56% are fighting corruption (extortion, bribery); and

•    55% are deploying environmentally-friendly technologies

As companies chase better costs to remain viable, the possibility of building a supply chain with poor ethical practices increases. There are several cases where non ethical sourcing practices are involved.

One of them is case of Rana Plaza factory that collapsed in Bangladesh. It became symbol of unethical and unfair treatment of workers.  Fashion companies that agreed to order goods from this factory, didn’t have reassurance that workers had safe and fair working environment, despite it they used factory services. This would be typical example of unethical sourcing practice.