October 24, 2013 –The Sustainability Consortium® (TSC®) successfully hosted its first China Forum: Supply Chain Sustainability, on October 24th at the Wenjin Hotel in Beijing, China. The Forum drew a diverse group of participants including TSC executives, government officials, academics, manufacturers and non-profit organizations.

Euan Murray, Chief Strategy Officer of TSC, announced the launch of TSC’s partnership with Nanjing University at the event. Weidong Zhou, TSC’s Managing Director of Greater China, spoke on TSC’s two-step strategy to help local organizations become more successful by incorporating sustainability principles into their business practices.

“Our first phase will focus on working with manufacturers to help them understand their sustainability hotspots and find cost-effective ways to make the appropriate improvements. We will do this through training programs, seminars, management tools and other activities. We are initially targeting four product categories to pilot this project: toys, electronics, general merchandise, as well as clothing, footwear and textiles,” said Zhou. “The second phase will focus on retail and consumption. We will identify tactics to help companies carry out cost-effective initiatives to improve sustainability and encourage more businesses to make sustainable choices.”

Dr. Jun Bi, Dean of the School of Environment at Nanjing University, along with TSC Chief Executive Officer Kara Hurst, BASF Vice President of Greater China Andrew Lee; Director of Office for Social Responsibility at China National Textile Apparel Council Yan Yan, and China Programme Director of Carbon Disclosure Project Li Rusong, participated in a panel discussion about how to improve business practices through sustainability measurement and reporting.

Nanjing University, TSC’s second academic partner outside of the United States after Wageningen University in the Netherlands, will ensure that TSC products are relevant to the Chinese market and can be used to help Chinese organizations find tangible business benefits in adopting sustainability principles.

“Nanjing University has an excellent reputation and a very good relationship with the Chinese government, local organizations and other key stakeholders. Dr. Jun Bi has a world-class team of experts that can make sure TSC has the best available scientific tools. As well, he can assist Chinese organizations in identifying all the business benefits of becoming more sustainable,” said Euan Murray, Chief Strategy Officer at TSC.

About The Sustainability Consortium
The Sustainability Consortium® (TSC®) is an organization of diverse global participants that work collaboratively to build a scientific foundation that drives innovation to improve consumer product sustainability. TSC develops transparent methodologies, tools, and strategies to drive a new generation of products and supply networks that address environmental, social, and economic imperatives.

The Sustainability Consortium advocates for a credible, scalable, and transparent process and system. The organization boasts over 100 members from all corners of business employing over 57 million people and whose combined revenues total over $1.5 trillion. The Sustainability Consortium is jointly administered by Arizona State University and University of Arkansas with additional operations at Wageningen University in the Netherlands and Nanjing University in China.

About Nanjing University
With a history of over a hundred and ten years, Nanjing University (NJU) has developed multi-disciplinary teaching and research programs in business, environmental studies and sustainability. With a motto of “Sincerity with Aspiration, Perseverance with Integrity”, NJU purports that green supply chain management of consumer products is one of the crucial issues that need to be addressed in order to improve environmental and social sustainability. Moreover, a suitable method of improving global supply chain can be accomplished through knowledge, learning and progressive social change.