Expert Analysis: Transparency – Reveal your Materiality Without Revealing your Trade Secrets! – Part 1

(Editor’s Note: 3E is expanding news coverage to provide customers with insights into topics that enable a safer, more sustainable world by protecting people, safeguarding products, and helping businesses grow. Expert Analysis articles, produced by 3E subject matter experts, researchers, and consultants as well as external thought leaders, examine the regulations, trends, and forces impacting the use, manufacture, transport, and export/import of chemicals). 

As chemical regulations continue to grow in complexity and customer requests for additional compliance and sustainability data increase, chemical and article manufacturers are looking for new and innovative ways to manage their customer requests, compliance obligations, and asks from Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) without giving away trade secrets.    

Gathering the data to accommodate those requirements can't be one-off requests made to suppliers, because the suppliers themselves are being overwhelmed by the constant requests coming back to them through their supply chain. Because of this, in some industry sectors, companies have turned to full material disclosure to decrease the frequency with which they need to reach out to suppliers, and to feel more confident in their own compliance determinations. Let's look at the main challenges when requesting full material disclosure (FMD) and the response to meet those needs.