Corporate responsibility

Corporate responsibility is a vital part of our operations

We seek to lead the way in responsible procurement. The very purpose of Hansel's operations – generating savings for the government – is responsible in itself. In addition to the Act on Public Contracts, our operations are guided by the central government procurement strategy, and the government resolutions and guidance on corporate responsibility issues and requirements.

We promote responsibility through framework agreements. We account for the economic, environmental and social aspects of responsibility to the maximum extent, during competitive tendering and the framework agreement period. In 2017, the products and services purchased by central government through our framework agreements amounted to approximately 800 million euros. This significant volume makes framework agreements an efficient method of implementing central government decisions on corporate responsibility in procurement.

In this regard, suppliers taking part in the tendering process are required to have fulfilled their social obligations properly: they must have paid their taxes and social security contributions, and complied with statutory demands related to environment, health and safety, working conditions and terms of employment.

We have accounted for the environmental aspects in our framework agreements for a number of years. Our corporate responsibility team goes through all new framework agreements to ensure that environmental aspects are accounted for. If a framework agreement has included environmental aspects in relation to two or more criteria set by Hansel, it is awarded Hansel’s own ecolabel.

Social elements may be incorporated in the terms and conditions of the contract, for example by requiring the supplier to commit to the key working condition conventions of the International Labour Organization (ILO).