Richard Bank and Lisa Harrington, directors of the Sustainable Supply Chain Foundation, bring us up to date on the group's efforts to introduce third-party verification of companies' sustainability programs.

A manufacturing renaissance is taking place in the United States. According to a recent MIT study, 14 percent of manufacturers have made definite plans to move some of their currently offshore production back stateside. An additional 30 percent are considering it. The common term being used for this is reshoring. The reshoring trend is growing and can garner goodwill with domestic customers, consumers and even legislators. But any careful decision to reshore or expand domestic manufacturing capacity will be predicated on goodwill benefits and growing profitability.

Years ago, supply management professionals turned to low-cost countries to manufacture products, establish services operations and source materials in an effort to improve the bottom line for their companies. They found that inexpensive labor in India, China and emerging Asian countries made this new low-cost-country strategy successful "” despite requiring the management of lengthy, complex supply chains. Then the world began to change.

Hennes & Mauritz, selling under the brand H&M, is the world's second-largest apparel company and the biggest buyer of clothes made in Bangladesh. That has put the Swedish retailer in an uncomfortable position after the death of a prominent labor activist a year ago and a garment factory fire that killed more than 100 workers in November.