Compliance is an integral part of corporate governance. Both we and our business partners attach utmost importance in this context to acting responsibly and in line with regulations.
© unsplash/Sollange Brenis
Compliance of our business partners
For GIZ, compliance is about more than keeping the rules – it is an expression of responsible cooperation. The same applies to our business partners. We share responsibility: for acting with integrity, handling public funds carefully and maintaining the trust of our clients and commissioning parties.
What we expect of our business partners
We consider compliance and integrity foundational for working relationships based on trust. This kind of cooperation requires that companies, employees and business partners share a common set of values. For GIZ, compliance is about fulfilling legislative requirements and contractual agreements and keeping voluntary commitments. This includes making responsible use of taxpayers’ money and observing human rights and environmental standards.
Zero tolerance of corruption
Our business partners must have adequate systems in place for preventing rule violations and detecting and penalising misconduct. This also involves being transparent with GIZ where there is good reason to suspect that rules have been violated. This is part of our zero-tolerance policy on corruption and other relevant compliance violations. Our anti-corruption policy reflects our ambition in this regard: GIZ takes a zero tolerance approach to inaction in all cases of corruption. We also expect our business partners to ensure responsible and compliant conduct among their own business partners and sub-contractors.
How we carry out checks on our business partners
Checks on business partners are necessary to protect GIZ from financial and reputational loss, as well as (criminal) breaches of law. This is how we ensure due diligence in the use of the funds entrusted to us.
We check for legal compliance and ethical conduct when selecting and working with our direct business partners. These checks are carried out in accordance with German and international standards in areas such as anti-corruption and the prevention of terrorist financing. We also evaluate other key aspects, such as the economic or technical suitability of business partners. GIZ uses a range of instruments to this end, including sanctions list checks, creditworthiness checks and media research regarding reputational risks).
We gear our checks to the type of business partner and particular context in question. These checking processes are carried out and refined on an ongoing basis by the specialist units responsible.