Respect for human rights

Basic concept of respect for human rights

In recent years, corporate leadership faced increasing expectations for working toward solutions to the growing challenges faced by global society in such areas as human rights, poverty, labor, and the environment.

Under such circumstances, the KITZ Group supports the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, an international standard concerning human rights, and the United Nations Global Compact (UNGC), which can be described as a roadmap toward solutions to social challenges from a local to a global scale. We signed the UNGC in August 2021.

The spirit of the UNGC conforms to the spirit of the Group’s corporate philosophy, and we intend to continue contributing to the sustainable growth of society by striving to implement the 10 principles of the Global Compact and encouraging each and every employee in the Group to act with a greater awareness of our social responsibilities.

Ｃode of conduct on respect for human rights

Under the KITZ Group Compliance Code of Conduct, which calls for respecting the human rights of every individual, preventing any act of harassment, and not encouraging or using forced labor or child labor, we advance initiatives to enable each and every KITZ Group employee to act based on thinking in line with relevant guidelines, conscious of their roles as members of global society.

Structure for promoting respect for human rights

The KITZ Group considers respect for human rights to be an integral part of sustainability management. For this reason, the Group Sustainability Promotion Committee, which is chaired by the general manager of the KITZ Management Planning Division and has a membership consisting of KITZ executive officers and the presidents of Group companies, develops and maintains the groupwide promotion structure and implements policies and measures intended to realize working environments free from discrimination.

Human rights initiatives

The KITZ Group maintains the following structure for human rights initiatives

1. Relief, rectification

Swift relief and corrective measures are taken in the event that the KITZ Group’s business activities are found to have negatively impacted human rights or to be involved in such negative impacts. For this reason, we maintain a structure to enable people in the organization to consult and report at any time with peace of mind concerning human-rights matters through the Compliance Helpline.

2. Disclosure

We disclose information on human rights initiatives through our website, Corporate report, and other means.

3. Initiatives to raise employee awareness

(1)Compliance surveysThe KITZ Group implements compliance surveys of all employees, intended both to identify potential compliance risks including those related to human rights and to implement improvements for risks identified through such means as business process improvements and education.

(2)Harassment prevention trainingThe KITZ Group is making progress on building workplaces that are free from harassment and have open atmospheres that enable appropriate reporting and responses. As part of these efforts, for managers, we implement harassment prevention training with participatory practice to enable them to be conscious and responsible in workplace management and to put the awareness and learning from training to use in the workplace. In FY 2019 and FY 2020, we held this training for KITZ Group managers in Japan, and 365 people took part.

For regular employees, we have begun training to raise the levels of knowledge and awareness regarding to harassment. In addition to in-person training, we offer a combination of various training methods, including video training with audio and e-learning, to ensure that employees can continue to receive education even in an environment with diverse work styles. In FY 2021, a total of 1876 persons of the KITZ domestic Group companies participated in-person training and e-learning.