Respect for Human Rights

Policy and Basic Mindset

Respecting Human Rights

To become “a corporate group centered on specialty chemicals that contributes to the global environment, human health, and an enriched future society,” as defined in “Vision UBE 2030 Transformation ~1st Stage~” from our “Vision for 2030,” the UBE Group has established the UBE Group Human Rights Policy as its policy for conducting corporate activities that respect human rights based on the UBE Corporate Philosophy, Purpose, and Management Principles.

The UBE Group Action Guidelines state our respect for individuals, fostering mutual understanding, and eliminating discrimination based on gender, nationality, race, disabilities, age, social status, religion, beliefs, or sexual orientation. In addition, the Group will refrain from all inhumane practices including forced labor, child labor, and human trafficking, as well as refraining from having any ties with individuals and organizations that are involved in such practices.

As a Group, we will continue to respect the human rights of all people and will advance proactive initiatives to continue living up to our Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR).

UBE Group Human Rights Guidelines

The UBE Group is committed to respecting human rights across all of its corporate activities. We comply with national and regional laws, regulations, and social norms in keeping with the globalization of our activities. We support and respect international standards on human rights, including the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and ILO Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work. We rapidly identify, prevent, mitigate, and appropriately remedy negative impacts on human rights from our corporate activities in order to meet our social responsibilities as a corporation.

Positioning of These Guidelines and Scope of Application

These guidelines are consistent with the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights. Together with the UBE Group Action Guidelines, they guide our human rights efforts across our corporate activities, which are based on the UBE Corporate Philosophy and UBE Management Principles. These guidelines apply to all officers and employees of the UBE Group. We also ask all of our business partners, the entire supply chain, and all other parties involved in our business activities to conduct themselves according to the principles of these guidelines and respect human rights.

We respect the fundamental human rights of all persons and endeavor to help people live in peace and security. Furthermore, we ask all stakeholders of our business to respect and not infringe upon human rights in order to avoid indirectly contributing to human rights infringements.

Prohibiting Discrimination

We prohibit discrimination in all of its forms, including based on gender, nationality, ethnic background, race, disability, health condition, age, social status, home environment, religion, faith, gender identification, sexual orientation, or type of employment.

Prohibiting Harassment

We prohibit harassment in any form that violates the dignity of individuals including sexual harassment, harassment involving abuse of power, and harassment of pregnant employees.

Rights of Workers

We respect the basic rights of workers, including the freedom of association and right to collective bargaining. We do not tolerate forced labor or child labor in any form. We also comply with the laws and regulations that apply in the countries and regions in which we operate and engage in responsible labor practices, including ensuring occupation health and safety in workplaces, fair and appropriate wages that take a living wage into account, and the proper management of working hours.

Education

We implement suitable human rights education to ensure that all officers and employees properly understand and are aware of human rights.

Human Rights Due Diligence

In order to meet our responsibility to respect human rights, we identify adverse impacts on human rights our corporate activities could have, based on the approach to human rights due diligence described in the Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights. We implement initiatives to prevent and mitigate adverse human rights impacts, and endeavor to undertake suitable and effective remedies if adverse human rights impacts arise from our corporate activities. We also work to correct adverse human rights impacts that arise in supply chains.

Addressing Human Rights Infringements

If a human rights infringement is discovered, we promptly remove the source of the infringement on human rights and undertake corrective countermeasures or cooperate on countermeasures with support from within and outside the Group. To ensure that we rapidly identify and correct human rights issues, we suitably operate grievance mechanisms and continually work to develop effective mechanisms.

Engagement

We utilize specialized knowledge on human rights from within and outside the Group in various ways, and continually engage in dialogue with stakeholders on human rights issues that surround the UBE Group, seeking to advance our human rights initiatives.

Masato Izumihara

President and Representative Director
UBE Corporation

Support for the UN Global Compact

The UBE Group signed the United Nations Global Compact in April 2021, and continues to uphold its principles.

The Group also joined the Global Compact Network Japan to further enhance its human rights protection efforts by participating in two subcommittees led by member organizations: the Human Rights Due Diligence (HRDD) Working Group and the Human Rights Education Working Group.

Announcing Our Support of the “My Jinken Declaration” (Declaration of Human Rights) Project Advocated by the Ministry of Justice

In August 2021, UBE announced its own “My Jinken Declaration” (Declaration of Human Rights), supporting the “My Jinken Declaration” project advocated by the Ministry of Justice.

The Ministry of Justice’s “My Jinken Declaration” initiative aims to realize a society in which everyone respects human rights. To this end, this initiative encourages various entities, including business corporations, and individual citizens to publicly declare their commitment to respecting human rights and to take action in keeping with such commitment.

President & Representative Director Masato Izumihara
UBE Group’s “My Jinken Declaration”

Management System

Human Resources and Human Rights Committee

To strengthen the Group-wide promotion of human resource management, respect for human rights, and human rights due diligence, we established the Human Resources and Human Rights Committee, which is led by officers in charge of the Human Resources Dept. and Sustainability Promotion Dept. This committee deliberates and reports on matters to Strategic Management Meetings (Sustainability Committee), which are chaired by the CEO.

The Human Resources and Human Rights Committee is an interdepartmental organization in the UBE Group that identifies risks to the Group related to human resource management, respect for human rights and human rights due diligence. While deliberating and making decisions on response policies, it also sets goals that it manages and promotes.

Human Capital Management Operation System

Targets and Performance

Human Rights Due Diligence Initiatives

We endeavor to identify, prevent, and address any human rights infringements in our activities. We are proceeding with a PDCA cycle based on the following process. Furthermore, because global stances on human rights have shifted remarkably as of late and societal expectations toward corporate human rights policies have grown since the time when the processes were formulated, we are proceeding with internal discussions toward upgrading our current processes and internal systems.

Disclose progress on the UBE Group’s website as necessary

Human Rights Due Diligence Progress

1. Desktop audits of Group company human rights risk by third-party agencies

In 2021, a specialized third-party agency carried out audits pertaining to human rights risks at 18 domestic (including UBE Corporation) and 21 overseas Group companies based on information from major global NGOs and media/SNS. The results showed that no risks demanded attention. We will continue conducting regular audits to investigate for human rights risks in the Group.

2. Investigating potential human rights risks through surveys given to employees attending e-Learning

In 2022, we coupled e-Learning for Group employees regarding human rights with a survey on risks related to human rights they felt in their work and daily lives in order to gauge opinions regarding potential human rights risks.

This survey was based on the Ministry of Justice’s Human Rights Bureau’s 25 categories of “risks associated with major human rights to be considered by companies as well as human rights related to corporate activities.” Based on the responses received, we assessed the negative impacts felt by Group employees in each category.

Results showed that among the 25 different categories, the greatest impact was felt in the “harassment” category. To address this, we are enhancing our consultation system and improving education on harassment through e-Learning.

3. Sharing the status of initiatives and issues with major overseas locations

For our major overseas locations, we utilize the Self-Assessment Checklist from the UN Guiding Principles Reporting Framework to confirm progress at each location and share the contents of specific initiatives. We will continue to research the horizontal deployment of initiatives while considering the legal and cultural backgrounds of each country.

4. Engaging with stakeholders

Currently, discussions are under way within each relevant department to promote engagement with stakeholders, and we conduct developmental reappraisals of human rights due diligence processes and internal systems to bring them in line with the wider range of countermeasures that recent and noteworthy changes in attitudes toward human rights demand.

5. Tracking the effectiveness of efforts

To track the effectiveness of human rights due diligence initiatives, we verify the status of reports related to human rights via our internal reporting system. There were seven reports related to human rights in fiscal 2023, all of which were improved through internal guidance.

6. Specifying respect for human rights in our procurement guidelines and conducting supplier inspections

Please refer to “Supply Chain Management.”

Human Rights Training and Education for Employees

We created a Groupwide framework to educate employees about human rights based on the UBE Group Human Rights Guidelines. We ensure that all employees understand and embody our stance on human rights in all aspects of business by providing ongoing training. In fiscal 2023, all UBE Group operations in Japan conducted an e-learning initiative marking Human Rights Week to showcase the topics of business and human rights and human rights due diligence and our initiatives to spread such awareness.

Human Rights Education Results (fiscal 2023)
Initiative	Times held	Participants
e-learning	1	7,042(Domestic Group operations, including directors)
New employee training	1	71(Parent company)
Job-specific training	1	428(Parent company)

Initiatives

Compliance Hotline for Human Rights Issues

In cases where a human rights infringement is revealed through internal reporting, business reports, or other channels, the UBE Group takes prompt action to correct the situation and administers the appropriate internal discipline. In addition, the Group reports such cases to management and disseminates this information throughout the Group to improve its efforts to ensure respect for human rights and to prevent recurrence. In fiscal 2023, there have been seven cases in which internal reporting took place, and all were improved upon through internal guidance.

Human Rights Initiatives in Supply Chains

The UBE Group Sustainable Procurement Guidelines, which include measures to address human rights, apply to all Group business partners in order to ensure that human rights are respected throughout the entire supply chain. The Guidelines clearly state that the Group will not tolerate any inhumane acts, including forced labor, child labor, or human trafficking.

In accordance with these guidelines, the Group assesses risks from the perspective of sustainability by conducting regular surveys of its major business partners. The Group also works with business partners to address such human rights issues as labor conditions and the risk of human rights infringement.

The fourth business partner sustainability surveys revealed that suppliers have implemented a certain level of initiatives and measures pertaining to the human rights issues covered by the survey.

For more information, see Supply Chain Management and Results of the Fourth Survey of Business Partners.

Social Respect for Human Rights