You know when you want great products but don’t want the guilt of knowing they came from questionable places? These days we all want to help the Earth, and now that’s more possible since Volkswagen’s move towards that more modern style of corporate responsibility. Let’s get into what occurred so you can see the great benefit this brings Volkswagen drivers and fans around the world!
In April of 2019, Volkswagen entered an extensive industry effort made of fellow businesses for the responsible sourcing of strategic minerals. According to Winner VW (Dover DE), this means Volkswagen cares about where their materials come from and their effect on the environment. This collaborative effort will apply blockchain technology to boost sustainability, performance, and clarity within global mineral supply connections. Accompanying this effort will facilitate the Volkswagen Group in increasing their insight into the derivation of cobalt, a mineral that is acquired in mining operations and that is utilized in lithium-ion batteries. These batteries are inside most modern electric vehicles and thus, are of great concern to Volkswagen and its buyers. This process also extends to a few other trace minerals pertinent to the production of vehicles.
Until recently, consumer brands, miners, smelters had to rely on lengthy 3rd-party audits and time-consuming manual processes to confirm compliance with commonly held enterprise standards. That changes with this group effort. One of the methods used in this collaboration is called a blockchain, which is a distributed, decentralized, and public digital record that is used to record activities across multiple computers so that any associated record cannot be changed retroactively, at least not without changing all subsequent blocks. Blockchain technology complements both contemporary estimation and audit systems as well as supports responsible sourcing standards produced by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), authorizing a perpetual record to better approach compliance provisions.
In essence, this blockchain process lets traceability and origin of minerals be transparent for all roles in the supply chain, and it does so in real-time. Groups in the network needing to trace and/or record the flow of minerals sourced are first, vetted for use of responsible sourcing standards by the RCS Global Group, and second, can provide and obtain stable data in a protected manner. Further, this blockchain network introduces members at each significant step of the supply chain.
More Info On The Volkswagen Group:
The Volkswagen Group is the biggest automaker in Europe as well as one of the globe’s top automobile manufacturers. The Group is composed of 12 brands from 7 different countries: Volkswagen Passenger Cars, Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles, Audi, Bentley, SEAT, Bugatti, Ducati, Lamborghini, ŠKODA, Porsche, Scania & MAN. In one business day, about 44,000+ vehicles are produced worldwide by this group, and they are also found working in services germane to vehicle production, marketing, and distribution. For selling vehicles, the Volkswagen Group operates in 153 countries currently! The Volkswagen Group will now bring to bear its inherent boundless industry capability as well as its 1st-hand awareness of sustainability to both suppliers and production offices universally.
