SECTION E: PRINCIPLE-WISE PERFORMANCE
PRINCIPLE 1: Ethics, Transparency and Accountability
- Does the policy relating to ethics, bribery and corruption cover only the company? Yes/No. Does it extend to the Group/Joint Ventures/Suppliers/Contractors/NGOs/Others?
The Company has adopted the TCoC to remain consistently vigilant and ensure ethical conduct of its operations. All internal and external stakeholders of the Tata Group are expected to work within boundaries of the TCoC. The Company ensures compliance of ethical standards by its vendors and contractors through appropriate clauses in its work contracts to which they are obligated. Generally, the contract includes clauses in relation to Human Rights Protection, Corruption practices and other things related to ethics. Training and awareness on TCoC is provided to all employees and relevant stakeholders are also made aware of the same from time to time.
The Company also has a whistle blower mechanism, which is being governed by the Whistle Blower Policy. Through this it has placed mechanisms for ensuring confidentialityand protecting the whistle blower from any harassment/ victimization. The policy covers instances pertaining to any unfair practice like retaliation, threat or intimidation of termination/suspension of service, disciplinary action, transfer, demotion, refusal of promotion, or the like including any direct or indirect use of authority to obstruct the Whistle Blower’s right to continue to perform his duties/ functions including making further Protected Disclosure. The policy is directly monitored by the Chairman of the Audit Committee and the Group Ethics Officer.
Ethics Helpline:
The Company has an ethics helpline where employees can place anonymous complaints against ethics violations as per the policy of the Company. The ethics helpline can be reached in the following ways:
Ethics Hotline:1800 1032931 / 022 2287 1839.
Oral reports will normally be documented by the Chief Ethics Counselor / Chairman of the Audit Committee by accessing the voice mail by a written transcription of the oral report.
Written application to Ethics and compliance:
All concerns can be reported to Chief Ethics Counselor / Chairman of the Audit Committee in Hindi, English or any regional language.
- How many stakeholder complaints have been received in the past financial year and what percentage was satisfactorily resolved by the management? If so, provide details thereof, in about 50 words or so.
Includes TCoC concerns, investor complaints and customer complaints
The Company has setup an investor grievance mechanism to respond to investor grievances in a timely and appropriate manner. The investor grievances are also reviewed at the Board level by an Investors’ Grievance Committee and immediate action is taken to resolve the same. The TCoC concerns are resolved through internal review mechanism by Ethics Counselor and Senior Management. Both the Commercial Vehicles Business Unit and Passenger Vehicles Business Unit have established robust customer care systems which track customer complaints and responds to them in the minimum time possible.
PRINCIPLE 2: Product Life Cycle Sustainability
- List up to 3 of your products or services whose design has incorporated social or environmental concerns, risks and/or opportunities.
The Company is a leading automobile manufacturer of India and has played a significant role over the years in contributing to economic growth through its commercial and passenger vehicles which transport people, goods and help notch time. The Company realizes its responsibility as a growth enabler and endeavors to create vehicles which will promote entrepreneurship. The Company is also cognizant about environmental impacts caused by the production and lifecycle of its products and continually strives to innovate measures to reduce such impacts. Keeping up with the momentum around deployment of sustainable vehicles created in 2017-18, during FY 2019, the Company initiated a supply of 40 units of the ‘Ultra 9m AC Electric buses’ to the Lucknow City Transport Services Ltd and 80 Electric buses to the West Bengal Transport Corporation. The Company has also collaborated with Capegemini to deploy Tigor EVs to Bengaluru, Chennai and Hyderabad. Below are few of the products which have been designed to address social or environmental concerns, risks and/or opportunities.
- For each such product, provide the following details in respect of resource use (energy, water, raw material etc.) per unit of product (optional):
- Reduction during sourcing/production/distribution achieved since the previous year throughout the value chain?
In order to reduce the vehicular weight, the focus of the Company is on the new and improved technologies so as to achieve higher fuel efficiency as well as it should reduce the environmental impact created by the vehicle, including its material sourcing, production, use and endof- life stages. Also in order to reduce the fuel consumption, the Company focuses on researching, developing and producing new technologies, such as hybrid engines, electric cars, fuel-cell vehicles. Various development programs to reduce the consumption of fuel, like the use of lightweight materials, reducing parasitic losses through the driveline and improvements in aerodynamics are also studied and implemented by the Company. At the sourcing stage, the Company work with its suppliers in order to reduce the environmental impacts like, by making use of returnable and recyclable packing solutions for majority of the components thereby managing the cost and the quality, as well as reducing the material use and avoiding waste generation. The Company was extensively working on green and light weighting technologies in products going beyond the basic Environmental regulatory compliance. The Company continuously strives to improve the sustainability performance of the product on Life Cycle basis.
- Reduction during usage by consumers (energy, water) has been achieved since the previous year?
The class leading fuel efficiencies of the Company’s vehicles enable the customers to achieve fuel savings which translate into cost savings as well. The REVOTRON engine epitomizes the FuelNext philosophy of the Company. It is developed using a range of eco-friendly and future oriented technologies. It also incorporates latest know-how like multi drive modes, allowing the best of economy and driving pleasure. The Company’s value proposition in the commercial vehicles is aimed to create vehicles with lowest overall cost of ownership. The Recon business, which reconditions aggregates, extends the life of the aggregates and eliminates the use of fresh resources that might have been consumed for new aggregates.
- Does the company have procedures in place for sustainable sourcing (including transportation)? If yes, what percentage of your inputs was sourced sustainably?
The Company continually works with its vendors and suppliers to reduce the environmental impacts of sourcing activity. The Company has an Environment Procurement Policy and Sustainability Policy to engage with its value chain partners on environmental sustainability. The Company has launched a sustainable supply chain initiative in FY 2017. Through this initiative the Company aims to firstly create awareness on the subject, call for suppliers’ sustainability data and subsequently conduct a site assessment for data verification. This initiative was conducted in 3 phases, where 52 suppliers were covered in Phase I, 66 suppliers were covered in Phase II and 115 suppliers were covered in Phase III.
The Company has also extended this initiative to our downstream and have initiated the Dealers Sustainability Initiative in FY 2019, 15 workshops and 27 dealers have been assessed where 22 of them have shared data related to Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions. A total of 237 dealers have been covered in the workshop. The Company noted a significant initiatives that have been taken to reduce the packaging impacts in the supply chain by using recycled/ returnable packaging solutions for various components sourced. Transportation and logistics optimization is an ongoing activity to reduce the related environmental impacts. The Pantnagar and Sanand plants have created a vendor park model wherein the key vendors are situated surrounding the plant. This not only enables to optimize the production related costs but also significantly reduces the environmental impact of transportation of components.
- Has the company taken any steps to procure goods and services from local & small producers, including communities surrounding their place of work? If yes, what steps have been taken to improve their capacity and capability of local and small vendors?
During the year, the Company procured 63.26% of the materials (by value) from local sources, where local is defined as the State in which the manufacturing plant is established.
The Company takes significant initiatives in enhancing the capabilities of local and small vendors.
To ensure reliable and responsible suppliers for automotive production and service parts, the Company expects all its suppliers to adopt the ISO 9001/IATF Quality Management System frameworks. The Company also encourage its dealers to adopt Quality, Environmental and Occupational Health & Safety Management Systems. In addition to this, the Company has an Environment Procurement Policy and Sustainability Policy to engage with its value chain partners on environmental sustainability.
- Does the company have a mechanism to recycle products and waste? If yes what is the percentage of recycling of products and waste (separately as <5%, 5-10%, >10%). Also, provide details thereof, in about 50 words or so.
Being the Company’s ongoing endeavor, it has a mechanism to recycle its products and limit the waste arising from production of vehicles. The Company has initiated well defined program ‘Prolife’ with objective to reduce waste and minimize the need of raw materials to produce a brand new item. In FY 2019, a total of 32,092 components were reconditioned and the reconditioned blocks were exported to international markets. Hazardous waste is disposed as per regulatory requirements through the Common Hazardous Waste Treatment, Storage & Disposal Facilities (CHWTSDF), authorized recyclers and coprocessing in cement plants.