Sustainable Supply Chain

We want to create the best value for our customers and our own business and to choose the optimum combination of whole life costs and benefits.

This includes the environmental, social and economic impact of our activities through design, material selection, manufacture, transportation, construction, usage and disposal.

Our ​Sustainability Strategy, Building New Futures, sets out our commitments to protect and enhance the environment and leave a positive social legacy. We have set targets across six focus areas – climate change, nature positive, resource efficiency, supply chain integrity, community engagement and employee diversity, equity and inclusion, all of which we are working collaboratively with our supply chain to achieve. Where applicable, our sub-contract tenders carry a minimum weighting of 10% for sustainability.

Our target is to continue to exceed the UK Government target to spend over a third of our direct and indirect spend with SMEs, including; voluntary, community and social enterprises.

Our Sustainable Procurement Policy sets out how we deliver sustainable outcomes through our procurement activity.

Balfour Beatty is a partner of the Supply Chain Sustainability School, an industry-led organisation driving the improvement of sustainability skills and knowledge of the built environment supply chain. The Supply Chain Sustainability School aims to build a best in class supply chain for the UK built environment sector.

The School provides CPD accredited e-learning modules and training workshops, tailored self-assessment and action plans, benchmarking tools, networking opportunities and access to thousands of online resources. The resources cover ten key topics: biodiversity, employment, skills & ethics, energy & carbon, environmental management, local business & community and materials, sustainable procurement, sustainability strategy, waste and water. Detailed information is given for the common building materials we use today; bricks, concrete, glass, steel, stone and timber.

As an industry, construction remains a high-risk sector for modern slavery and associated issues (such as labour exploitation) for a number of reasons – including both its transient workforce and complex global supply chains for both skills and materials.

Balfour Beatty is committed to doing everything we can to play our part in our business in identifying violations, rooting out and closing the spaces where they occur, and to operating in compliance with the regulatory duties imposed on us. When it comes to our wider indirect construction supply chain, the situation is more complex. We have adopted a proactive, risk-based approach to managing the risks, continually reinforcing messages with supply chain partners about our expectations and standards, promoting ethical practices, and ultimately, by taking decisive action where necessary. We want to be sure that those working on our behalf are acting as Balfour Beatty expects.

Read our 2024 Modern Slavery Supply Chain Statement here.