Engaging stakeholders

• Constant dialog with our stakeholders

Our stakeholders include employees, customers, suppliers and shareholders, as well as experts in science, industry, politics, society and media. Parts of our business activities, such as the use of new technologies, are frequently viewed by our stakeholders with a critical eye. In order to increase societal acceptance for our business activities, we take on critical questions, assess our business activities in terms of their sustainability, and communicate transparently. Such dialogs help us to even better evaluate which measures we should pursue to keep people informed on these topics, establish trust, and form partnerships.

To get our stakeholders even more closely involved, the Board of Executive Directors once again met with international experts from science and industry – the Stakeholder Advisory Council – in 2015 to discuss important aspects of sustainability. These included topics like the influence of externalities and the challenges of renewable raw materials, especially palm kernel oil.

We have a particular responsibility toward our production sites’ neighbors. With the established community advisory panels, we aim to promote open exchange between citizens and our site management, and strengthen trust in our activities. In 2015, for example, we tackled a concrete recommendation made by the Stakeholder Advisory Council in 2014 and developed global recommendations for the community advisory panel system.

BASF is also involved in worldwide initiatives with various stakeholder groups, such as the U.N. Global Compact. The U.N. Secretary General appointed BASF’s Chairman of the Board of Executive Directors as a member of the U.N. Global Compact Board for another three years. In the worldwide network of Global Compact LEAD, we are participating in the implementation of the “Agenda 2030” adopted by the United Nations in 2015, along with its Sustainable Development Goals. BASF is also active in local Global Compact networks.

We have been part of the Global Business Initiative on Human Rights since 2012, a group of globally operating companies from different industries whose goal is to advance respect for human rights in business. This included presenting examples of how to implement the U.N. Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights. In 2015, we were also involved in the consultation process of the German government’s national plan of action on this topic.

Furthermore, BASF is a founding member of a cross-industry initiative of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD). Together, a method was developed for evaluating the societal impact of products throughout their entire life cycle.

Our lobbying and political communications are conducted in accordance with transparent guidelines and in keeping with our publicly stated positions. BASF does not in principle support political parties. The BASF Corporation Employees Political Action Committee, established by our employees in the United States, is an independent, federally registered employee association that collects donations for political purposes and independently decides how these are used.