Responsible Sourcing Basics
Responsible sourcing refers to the effort to purchase products that comply with and often exceed legal and ethical standards to promote environmental, social and animal welfare benefits.
Examples of environmental benefits include no deforestation or impacts to water quality while social benefits include no forced or child labor and fair living wages for workers. Animal welfare standards focus on humane practices, including no confinement and providing ample food, water and shelter. These efforts can positively transform global supply chains.
Many of the essential products used in hotels such as linens, towels, food and beverages, cleaning solutions, and associated packaging are often produced in ways that can negatively impact people and the environment. By understanding these impacts, the hospitality industry can identify opportunities to source more responsible alternatives.
- Deforestation-Free: Products not linked to the clearing of natural forests
- Carbon/Greenhouse Gas Footprint: The total greenhouse gases emitted into the atmosphere as a result of an activity, product, person, or organization
- Circular Economy: A model focused on reusing, recycling, and minimizing waste
- Oxo-degradable materials: Conventional plastics with additives that make them break down faster into small fragments when exposed to heat or sunlight, but are not fully biodegrable and can create microplastics
- Oxo-biodegradable materials: Conventional plastics with additives that help them first fragment through oxidation (from heat, light, or oxygen) and then biodegrade over time through microbial activity; full biodegradation is not guaranteed and depends on environmental settings
- Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (PFAS): Man-made chemicals used for water-, stain-, and heat-resistant products like cookware, textiles, and packaging; known as “forever chemicals” because they don’t break down easily and can accumulate in the environment and the human body, posing potential health risks
- Sustainable Products: Products that are made or used in ways that lower environmental and/or social impacts at key points in their lifecycle
- Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs): Carbon-based chemicals that easily evaporate into the air at room temperature; emitted from products such as paints, cleaning agents, adhesives, and textiles and can contribute to indoor air pollution and health issues
- Audit: A formal review or inspection of a supplier’s operations
- Due Diligence: The process of assessing and managing risks in a supply chain
- Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR): Environmental policy approach where the producer of a product is held responsible for the end-of-life management like recycling, take-back, or safe disposal
- Greenwashing: Communication tactic used by companies and organizations to present their products or services as more environmentally friendly than they really are, often through misleading marketing, selective disclosure of facts, or exaggerated claims about sustainability
- Sustainability Certification: Third-party verification that a product or supplier meets specific standards (e.g., Fair Trade, FSC, Rainforest Alliance, and Green Key Global; brought to you by the American Hotel and Lodging Association and Hotel Association of Canada)
- Traceability: The ability to track a product or material back to its origin and document practices within a supply chain
- Value Chain: The full range of activities that add value to a product or service from design to delivery and beyond.