10% publicly-traded companies in the U.S. who filed form SDs with the federal government have proven it is possible to not only comply with Section 1502 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, but also to perform supply chain due diligence in line with industry best practices, according to an analysis of public filings by Assent Compliance.
Yet, more than three years after U.S. companies began filing reports about their efforts to find conflict minerals linked to armed militias in Africa in their supply chains, more than 70% say they still can’t make a determination.
U.S.-listed companies are required to investigate their supply chain for the presence of tin, tantalum, tungsten and gold (commonly known as 3TG in metals circles), under a rule stemming from the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act. The law is meant to choke off mining revenue to militia groups in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and adjacent countries.
As well-meaning as it is, even last year many companies were not able to fully vet their supply chains and have previously said so in their filings.
This year, 10% of Form SD and CMR (conflict minerals) filers were found to be 100% SEC Rule compliant and 67% were at or above the 75% compliance threshold. In all, SD and CMR filers averaged a compliance score of 79%, a generally high degree of compliance.
More than 100 companies said or implied they had conflict-free products, Dr. Chris Bayer, PhD of Tulane University, who supervised Assent’s analysis, found. But only 19 companies, including Intel (NASDAQ:INTC), Qualcomm (NASDAQ:QCOM), Cree (NASDAQ:CREE), Hasbro (NASDAQ:HAS) and Texas Instruments (NASDAQ:TXN), actually underwent an audit for those claims on one or more of their products.