Quality of Products and Services
Management System
Policy and Basic Approach
In its Corporate Mission, the Mitsui Chemicals Group establishes increased customer satisfaction as one of its social contribution areas. In addition, our Responsible Care Policy states that we will provide high-quality products and services that satisfy the needs of our customers and respond to the trust that they place in us. To retain our customers’ trust by offering products and services that fully satisfy their needs, we are taking a two-pronged approach to quality management through quality control and quality assurance to improve our management levels more than ever across the supply chain.
We have identified specific principles for global quality management in order to ensure a uniform awareness of the basic acceptable level of quality. We are now working to roll out these principles across the Group as a whole.
The Mitsui Chemicals Group’s Global Quality Management Principles
The Mitsui Chemicals Group makes every effort to increase customer satisfaction via a two-pronged approach to quality management, based on quality control ("built-in quality activities" *1) and quality assurance ("activities that win over customers’ trust" *2). In this regard, the Company has identified the following principles.
- Provide customer-oriented products and services
- Clarify customers’ requirements and ensure quality
- Design and provide products that also look beyond immediate customer needs
- Propose and provide new products and services that address customers’ needs
- Ensure objective and transparent quality assurance
- Give priority to compliance with laws and regulations over the pursuit of any profit
- Put in place a framework that enables a prompt response when an issue occurs
- Ensure the independence of the Quality Assurance Division
- Put in place a framework that allows the stable supply of products
- Ensure quality control from the procurement of raw materials to the delivery of products to customers
- Adhere strictly to a policy of management of change and non-conforming product control
- Create a more open corporate culture
- Adhere strictly to a policy of "report, contact, and consult;" promote the sharing of information between departments
- Undertake the exchange and horizontal deployment of quality assurance information and techniques across the Group
*1 Built-in quality activities:
Our built-in quality activities aim to minimize discrepancies at every stage of the process, including purchasing, design and development, logistics, sales, and manufacturing, to enable every department to provide the same quality of products and services.
*2 Activities that win over customers’ trust:
Our activities that win over customers’ trust meanwhile are aimed at resolving issues from the customer's perspective, and are spearheaded by the Quality Assurance Department, independently of our sales and manufacturing sections.
Quality Management Philosophy
System and Responsible Officers
The President bears the ultimate responsibility for quality management. Based on the Responsible Care Policy, we have established company rules and determined basic items for quality management, and the RC & Quality Assurance Division oversees quality management for the entire Mitsui Chemicals Group under the direction of the responsible officer for the RC & Quality Assurance Division. Each business sector president is responsible for the quality control of their division, and each division, logistics division, purchasing division, Works, and laboratory promotes quality control based on the policies and strategies of the RC & Quality Assurance Division.
In fiscal 2020, we established a Global Policy on quality management for the development of an advanced quality management system for the Mitsui Chemicals Group as a whole, including increased support for subsidiaries and affiliates in Japan and overseas.
Quality Management System
Internal Audits
The RC & Quality Assurance Division conducts product quality audits of each division of the Mitsui Chemicals Group.*
Quality audits | Auditing Division | RC & Quality Assurance Division |
---|---|---|
Scope | Works of Mitsui Chemicals, Inc., business divisions, logistics and purchasing divisions, and domestic and overseas affiliates of consolidated subsidiaries that have a manufacturing division (including production contractors). May include other affiliates, as necessary. | |
Details | Confirms using the actual records, forms, etc., used at the worksite that product quality compliance is observed, and a quality management system that assures customers of the quality is established and operated. Creates the audit program for the following year after reviewing the current year’s audit findings and risks inside and outside the Company. The integrity of product audits was also checked. In recent years, remote audits were also utilized. | |
Frequency | Once every one to three years (depending on size, business type, and management level of the audited organization). |
*The Internal Control Division, as the third line of risk management, conducts audits from an independent standpoint to ensure that the audits are properly carried out.
Goals and Results
No PL accidents or serious product quality incidents occurred in FY2022.
PL accidents & serious product quality incidents
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Metric | Scope | FY2022 | FY2023 | FY2030 (Medium to Long-term) | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Goals | Results | Level Achieved | Goals | Goals | ||
Incidence of PL accidents & serious product quality incidents | Mitsui Chemicals Group | 0 | 0 | ○ | 0 | Zero (over the course of VISION 2030) |