SGS Is One of the Founder Members of the Association for Professional Social Compliance Auditors

ARCUEIL, France - Oct. 29, 2015 - PRLog -- The APSCA was created to ensure the professionalism, consistency and credibility of individual auditors and organizations performing independent social compliance audits, and to promote the use of independent social compliance audits, as a tool to advance workplace conditions for workers globally. The APSCA certification process will ensure auditors have consistent training, education, background checks, and demonstrated competencies that are standard requirements in comparable professional auditor associations.

Ensuring Corporate Social Responsibility

Social compliance audits, often conducted by third party auditing firms, are one of the tools used by multinational organizations to assess supply chain facilities’ and farms’ compliance with local and international expectations of labor conditions. A result of a year’s effort on the part of leading social compliance auditing firms, including Arche Advisors, Bureau Veritas, Intertek, RINA, SGS, TÜV Rheinland, TÜV Süd, and UL, APSCA has been created to meet industry needs as supply chains become increasingly global and while hundreds of thousands of social compliance audit reports are already in circulation.

“Today, working conditions around the world are increasingly scrutinized by consumers and media, and multinational organizations are expecting more transparency from their suppliers. However, social compliance audits performed to-date are inconsistent,” said Roger Brockway of the International Federation of Inspection Agencies (IFIA), a major sponsor of APSCA.

“As challenges for workers around the world continue to evolve, and companies’ Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) needs continue to expand, it is more important than ever to bring consistency to the social compliance auditing industry. Companies and workers throughout the world rely on the oversight provided by social compliance audits, and APSCA endeavors to provide a leading level of assurance.”

APSCA welcomes applicants to register for APSCA certification starting January 1st, 2016. Primarily focusing on members from the social compliance auditing industry, APSCA will later include other types of auditors such as internal auditor staff from brand or retailer organizations.
Additionally, as the association expands, APSCA is actively seeking an executive director to lead this initiative, and is also currently forming an executive and stakeholder board to be fully functional in the coming weeks.

About SGS Sustainability and Supply Chain Services

SGS has been involved in social responsibility since its inception and has been offering tailored audit services since 1996. Supported by a large network of auditors, SGS has extensive experience in evaluating operations with particular emphasis on factory capability, labor standards, environmental compliance and business integrity.

For more information, please contact an SGS representative.

Website: www.sgs.com/socialresponsibility
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/sgs-consumer-goods-&-retail

SGS is the world’s leading inspection, verification, testing and certification company. SGS is recognized as the global benchmark for quality and integrity. With more than 80,000 employees, SGS operates a network of over 1,650 offices and laboratories around the world.