Apple Partners with Chinese Environmental Group for Supplier Audit
While Apple has received much publicity for its partnership with the Fair Labor Association to audit working conditions at several of its manufacturing partners' facilities in China, Financial Times reports that the company has now also partnered with the Institute of Public and Environmental Affairs (IPE) for an environmental audit of a supplier's facilities.
Apple has agreed to a jointly monitored audit of pollution controls at a supplier's factory in China, in what activists see as a breakthrough in their efforts to persuade the world's most valuable company to address environmental concerns.
A maker of printed circuit boards for the Silicon Valley company is due to be inspected in the next few weeks by auditors, with Apple and the China-based Institute of Public and Environmental Affairs (IPE) jointly monitoring their efforts.
According to the report, Apple and the IPE have been in discussions for months about a partnership, culminating in a five-hour meeting in Cupertino last October that set the stage for a formal relationship. Following this initial audit, the IPE hopes that it will be able to partner with Apple on audits of thirteen other facilities in China that are already being monitored by Apple.
The IPE is led by Ma Jun, an environmental activist who just today was announced as one of six winners of this year's Goldman Environmental Prize.
In October, the activist and author met with senior Apple executives in San Francisco and Cupertino to discuss his report, published a month earlier, on health hazards caused by pollution in the company's Chinese supply chain.
Ma will be at the War Memorial Opera House in San Francisco on Monday to receive the Goldman Environmental Prize for "bringing unprecedented environmental transparency and empowering Chinese citizens to demand justice." His work has prompted the Chinese government and multinational corporations, including Apple, to more seriously confront the issues he has long been raising.
As part of its environmental disclosures, Apple has noted that it focused on 14 suppliers for environmental audits in 2011, and the company is expanding its efforts in 2012 to include additional facilities, work more closely with governmental and nongovernmental agencies such as the IPE, and increase training on environmental responsibility throughout its supply chain.
Popular Stories
Apple News is providing Live Activities support for the 2024 U.S. presidential election, allowing iPhone and iPad users to track electoral results in real time directly from their Lock Screen.
The feature is rolling out for U.S. users over the course of Election Day, November 5, providing continuous updates of the electoral count. So if you're interested, you don't need to repeatedly check...
Apple today seeded the second betas of upcoming iOS 18.2 and iPadOS 18.2 updates to developers, and Apple is continuing to refine the Apple Intelligence capabilities. There are also a handful of smaller features that are worth knowing about.
Find My
Find My has a new option to Share Item Location with an "airline or trusted person" that can help you locate something that you've misplaced....
Apple has started notifying users about an upcoming revision to its iCloud Terms and Conditions, which takes effect on Monday, September 16.
We compared the text of the upcoming iCloud Terms and Conditions with the current U.S. version from September 18, 2023 and identified four key changes:
"Apple ID" references have been changed to "Apple Account" throughout.
iCloud users must agree to ...
Black Friday is still a few weeks away, but you can already find great prices on numerous iPads, including the 9th generation iPad, 10th generation iPad, iPad Air, and iPad mini.
Note: MacRumors is an affiliate partner with some of these vendors. When you click a link and make a purchase, we may receive a small payment, which helps us keep the site running.
Of course, there is a chance that ...
With the second beta of iOS 18.2 that's available for developers today, Apple has further fleshed out the ChatGPT integration that's available with Siri. In the Settings app, there's now a section that shows the ChatGPT daily limit, and offers an option to upgrade to the paid ChatGPT Plus plan.
The beta includes an Advanced Capabilities section with a "Daily Limit" reading that shows up as...
The first wave of reviews of Apple's new M4-powered MacBook Pro models were published this morning. We've collected some of the latest impressions from YouTube channels and select media outlets below.
Apple last month announced the new 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro models, adding next-generation M4, M4 Pro, and M4 Max chips, with Thunderbolt 5 ports on higher-end models, display and camera ...
Black Friday is just around the corner, and Apple Watch deals have begun appearing ahead of the shopping holiday on November 29. In this article, we'll take a look at all of the best early Black Friday Apple Watch deals, including the new Series 10 models.
Note: MacRumors is an affiliate partner with some of these vendors. When you click a link and make a purchase, we may receive a small...