Annual
Report 2013

Our business strategy includes a good and close relationship with our suppliers, which is backed by a structured dialogue process. We have been improving our relationships by contacting our different business partners every day to engage them in practices that focus on sustainability-oriented management efforts.

Since 2006, we hold a Meeting of Suppliers every year. With this initiative, we aim to strengthen our interpersonal relationships and encourage the exchange of information with our business partners. In 2013, during the seventh edition, whose theme was Sustainability: Ethics and Transparency, presentations addressed our efforts regarding compliance and internal controls – which we recommended to our suppliers – as a way to protect our longevity, the legitimate interests of our stakeholders, and our own reputation. This event brought together 51 professionals from 44 companies, who claimed they were fully satisfied (100% approval rate), according to a post-meeting survey.

In the field of ethics, discussions focused on the fight against corruption, including graft, and money laundering, a growing concern among agents and institutions in the financial market.

Just like previous meetings, suppliers were invited to sign a commitment letter that states the practices we adopt, cherish, and recommend to encourage them to use them in their businesses. During FY 2013, 37 new companies signed the document and 17 renewed their commitment.

This commitment also includes periodic visits from our representatives to partner companies to learn more about the reality of the businesses that undertook to incorporate such guidelines into their management processes.