Are ETI member companies ethical and responsible?

Every company sourcing from global supply chains has human rights risks in those supply chains. The complexity of modern supply chains — spanning multiple tiers, countries and sectors — makes this a near-universal reality, regardless of how seriously a company takes its responsibilities. ETI membership does not mean a company has solved these problems. It means the company has acknowledged they exist, made a serious public commitment to addressing them, and is doing the work.

That distinction matters, because the alternative — companies claiming clean supply chains without credible evidence — is far more concerning than companies openly engaging with the challenges they face. ETI's accountability framework is designed precisely around this honest starting point.

What ETI membership does require is genuine commitment to progress. Member companies sign up to the ETI Member Charter, adopt the ETI Base Code across their supply chains, and report annually against ETI's Corporate Transparency Framework on what they are finding and what they are doing about it. That reporting is not a box-ticking exercise — it includes honest disclosure of where problems have been identified and what remediation is underway. Members who fail to demonstrate meaningful progress can, and do, face sanction or termination.

Importantly, the credibility of ETI membership comes not just from what companies commit to, but from who holds them to it. Because ETI's governance includes trade unions and NGOs alongside companies, member companies are accountable to the very organisations that represent workers' interests and monitor corporate behaviour in the field. That accountability is structural — it is built into how ETI works — and it is something no self-certification scheme or standalone audit can replicate.

So are ETI member companies perfect? No. Are they more committed, more transparent, more actively engaged in improving workers' lives than companies who have made no such commitment? Consistently, yes.

Read more about ETI's accountability approach
See member transparency reporting
Find out about the ETI Member Charter