Global Trace

Background

Global Trace enables brands, producers, and manufacturers to track and trace products while detecting supplier risk through their entire supply chain. Global Trace is an interoperable and commodity-agnostic tool, created to respond to increasing demands for responsibly produced products. Global Trace can facilitate mapping between supply chain tiers, tracing of product inputs, and management of risk assessment data from source to the point of purchase. It is widely understood that tracing goods is critical for identifying, addressing, and preventing labor violations in global supply chains.

Supply chain risks are particularly acute in upstream production activities, such as raw material extraction and agricultural production, which serve as inputs to other industries. These can be included in the U.S. Department of Labor List of Goods Produced by Child Labor or Forced Labor, as required under the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act (TVPRA).

Global Trace helps users exceed these demands by supporting collaboration among brands and suppliers using their preexisting due diligence structures to provide real time visualization on supply chain risks. The tool enables users to identify suppliers at each tier of their supply chain for a specific raw material or category of spend. Global Trace helps users demonstrate their commitment to transparency and accountability as the number of products under scrutiny for labor and sourcing practices increases across supply chains.

For additional information, please visit the Global Trace Protocol (GTP) Project website. Here you can access resources such as a traceability glossary, traceability context analysis, commodity mapping reports, and lessons learned through real world implementation.

Technical Solution

Global Trace was engineered to be customizable and flexible to accommodate any type of supply chain. Six configuration steps are required to set up an “instance” of Global Trace specific to the needs of the organization managing the deployment of the system. These steps are further detailed below in the Technical Documentation.

1. Define the products in the supply chain and assign Key Data Elements (KDEs) to each product.
2. Define the user roles and user permissions in the Global Trace instance.
3. Create a tier map of the supply chain, showing how products will flow and where Critical Tracking Events (CTEs) occur. Assign input and output products (defined in Step 1) for each transformation per Role (defined in Step 2).
4. Define a risk management taxonomy (list of indicators) to be used as the framework upon which users will combine Risk Assessment reports and other data inputs.
5. Upload the assessments or self-assessment questionnaires (SAQs) to be used for each Producer Role (defined in Step 2). Questions in each assessment will align with the List of Indicators (defined in Step 4) and responses will contribute to the overall risk associated with a producer.
6. Specify the method by which various assessment inputs will be combined to determine the overall risk associated with a Producer. These inputs can include: external risk indices, assessment or SAQ responses (defined in Step 5), DNA test results, and compliance reports filed by assessors (defined in Step 2).

Additional Annexes are also provided, detailing:

1. The process of adding external risk indices for specify country and commodity level risk.
2. The process of translating the Global Trace platform into other languages.
3. The process for configuring purchases and sales within the supply chain.
4. The process used to trace products with Global Trace.
5. The process of interfacing with external identifier systems such as Open Supply Hub.
6. Supporting resources including links to training manuals, training videos, and configuration files for cotton and cobalt (industries Global Trace was piloted in).
7. Best practice guidelines for traceability from the Global Trace Protocol project.

User Support Resources

Please find user support resources here including links to training videos and user manuals. Please also review the Appendix of this page below for more information, including the best practice guidance provided in the Appendix F.

Technical Documentation

The technical documentation page is designed for developers, providing an in-depth description of the code behind the Global Trace platform. For more practical information on Global Trace, due diligence and risk management, please visit Global Trace Protocol (GTP) Project website. to navigate to the technical documentation page.

Follow this link to navigate to the technical documentation page.