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Responsible Care is the chemical industry's commitment to continual improvement in all aspects of health, safety and environmental performance and to openness about its activities, achievements, plans and targets. This unique commitment has grown to encompass most of the world's chemical industry following its first beginnings as a framework for improvement for the Canadian Chemical Producers Association (CCPA) in 1985. It has grown organically by absorbing the new ideas of the joining federations who have all in their own way influenced the developing programme and the new stakeholder requirements that have emerged over the last decade. |
The ICCA now co-ordinates the fundamentals of the Responsible Care whilst leaving room for some interpretation and emphasis by the national federations. Eight common fundamental features (see Appendix 1) are intended to ensure global consistency of the initiative for the industry and for its stakeholders. Implementation of these eight features by an association and its members will promote the sought-for improvement in HS&E performance and effective dialogue with interested parties.
The first feature is a set of Guiding Principles which, though not exactly the same for all federations, commit a member company at chief executive level to manage its activities so that they present an acceptably high level of protection for the health and safety of employees, customers and the public, and for the environment. The third feature incorporates a series of Codes or Guidance to assist companies to achieve the commitment. The fourth seeks to provide people both inside and outside the industry with the assurance that Responsible Care is delivering the results of HS&E performance improvement. Many federations already publish "Indicators of Performance": all federations are committed to do so in time. The fifth feature defines the approach companies and federations should make in providing open and honest communication to all those who have an interest in its conduct.
The collective power not only of national associations, but other groupings such as CEFIC and the ICCA, generates an enormous momentum of first class guidance and HS&E best practice without parallel in any other sector. Responsible Care provides an excellent forum in which these ideas flourish, and this process of debate, partnership and encouragement forms the bases of the sixth and seventh features. The final feature, and the most recent, requires the operation of systematic procedures to verify the implementation of the measurable elements of Responsible Care by the member companies. Verification is reported on in detail in the section on performance improvement.
In assessing the applications of new federations to Responsible Care membership, the ICCA leadership group takes note of the applicants' progress in the planning and completion of detailed implementation of all eight features.
