Our integrated resorts source sizeable quantities of products and a wide array of services. We are fully aware of our power to extend our sustainability commitments into our supply chain; with responsible purchasing specifications and supplier engagement, we further create positive impact through rigorous procurement processes.
Our Approach to Sustainable Sourcing
Integral to our approach is establishing a diverse network through long-term engagement with our suppliers, which enables us to respond promptly and effectively to disruptions in the supply chain that may arise. These range from disease outbreaks to extreme weather events. Ensuring that our supply chain is climate resilient means that we must strengthen our suppliers’ capacity to address natural disasters and to manage any potential disruptions to the supply chain. Sustainable sourcing also translates to investing in local suppliers and local economies. This is well demonstrated by our impact in Macau where 80% of our resorts’ procurement is with local businesses or distributors, of which 33% involves local, micro and small enterprises. In Manila, 90% of our procurement supports local businesses. We regularly invite our resort suppliers to a series of Procurement Sustainability & Green Initiatives workshops, raising their awareness around the “whys and hows” of sustainable sourcing. Suppliers are also introduced to our Heart-of-House - to see how we achieve not only our high standards for hygiene, safety and health and how we treat and care for our people, but also our practices to reduce environmental impact.
READ MORE IN OUR SUSTAINABILITY REPORT
Chemicals
Our updated sustainable sourcing guidelines for all our cleaning products and detergents purchased across our integrated resorts in 2018 provide a product sustainability rating methodology (green, amber or red rating depending on sustainability attributes). This rating clearly communicates our preference for internationally-recognized, high-quality products from reputable third-party eco-labels such as Green Key and Green Seal, while complying with all local regulations on safety and sanitation. In 2019, all our hotels in Macau received Green Key awards, demonstrating our commitment to minimizing our environmental footprint and to sourcing more sustainable chemical products.
Our Macau supply chain and operational teams made significant advancement in progressively phasing out red chemical products and replacing them with amber or green alternatives as part of our biannual tender renewal process. Our City of Dreams Manila Supply Chain team reviewed all cleaning products and detergents, prioritizing the phase-out of high-spend red products and replacing them with eco-labeled alternatives, which altogether had accounted for more than 40% of our total spend on cleaning products and detergents in Manila in 2018.
Looking ahead, we are planning to identify additional opportunities to transition from amber products to green products at our resorts, by collaborating closely with our strategic chemical suppliers. We will also expand the scope of our program to chemical products purchased by contractors on our behalf, such as for example paints and coatings during the design and construction of new buildings.
Seafood
To date, our efforts towards sustainably sourcing seafood at our resorts have been devoted to conducting a comprehensive assessment to understand the risks associated with the seafood that we purchased. Evaluation criteria considered major threats to the seafood industry, including issues such as species conservation status, risk of illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing, traceability, and ecosystem degradation.
Our sustainable sourcing guidelines outline our preference for Marine Stewardship Council (MSC), Aquaculture Stewardship Council (ASC) or Best Aquaculture Practices (BAP) certified seafood. As we increase our sourcing of seafood that is certified to credible eco-labels, we are engaging our suppliers to integrate chain-of-custody requirements into the procurement process and along the supply chain. This includes MSC chain-of-custody training to our supply chain and restaurant colleagues.
We also took the step to remove shark fin completely from all menus of our self-operated restaurants and provided training to our F&B colleagues to ensure they offer alternatives to our guests. In addition, we are continuing our work with our F&B tenants to minimize shark-fin consumption across all of our resorts. Going forward, we aim to confirm our baseline and targets for sustainable seafood by 2020, following the implementation of a new procurement system across all resorts. We will also be embedding new data requirements for our seafood suppliers as new seafood contracts are awarded in the coming years to ensure we have better visibility over where our seafood comes from.
READ MORE IN OUR SUSTAINABILITY REPORT