Organizations that want to become more sustainable often take actions towards their “own” (internal) operations. Often, however, sustainability issues, however, are caused elsewhere in the supply chain. Focusing on the own operations overlooks the dynamics of supply chain interactions and neglects the effect of these actions on upstream and downstream operations. Furthermore, the supply chains of Multinational Enterprises (MNEs) consist of (tens of) thousands of suppliers from all over the world and they are being held responsible for suppliers’ unsustainable actions by consumers.
To improve supply chain sustainability, companies need to increase the scope of their sustainability activities to their extended supply chains.