New Earth B is a certified B Corp known for its long-standing work in developing tools to apply Social Life Cycle Assessment.
The company created the Social Hotspot Database (SHDB), which helps organizations identify and prioritize social risks across countries and sectors. The new version, SHDB v6.2, includes updated and more detailed data to better support companies in managing their social responsibility.
As SHDB’s distributor in Italy, and as a long-standing collaborator with specific expertise in Social Life Cycle Assessment (S-LCA), we asked New Earth B to share more details on the key updates and what they mean for businesses using the database.
- Which are the major updates and improvements in v6.2 and how do they make the SHDB more accurate and useful for users?
SHDB v6.2 brings updates to its fundamental components of- MRIO supply chain modelling, worker hours model, and wage assessment model along with three subcategories. The goal is to enable users to conduct social risk analysis with confidence by delivering them results that are more accurate, granular and decision ready.
- Updated worker hours and wage assessment model: Worker hours and wage model are the core of hotspots screening and weighting of social risks. A complete update to the worker hours estimates, strengthens the credibility of labour hours distribution, and also improves how the SHDB translates economic activity into worker hours across countries and sectors. Similarly, an updated wage assessment calculation ensures accurate wage related risk interpretation.
- Updated MRIO backbone GTAP9àGTAP11 (2017 reference year): The v6.2 comes integrated with the GTAP11 as compared to the earlier GTAP9 in the version 5. This brings users three major benefits- Newer representation of the global trade representation, Better coverage of economic sectors (from 57 to 65), and a more recent reference year baseline of 2017.
- Refreshed risk levels: Version6 also brings completely updated risk level assignment for the 3 most scrutinized SHDB subcategories of-child labor, forced labor, and wage assessment.
- From your perspective, what are the biggest challenges companies face when trying to integrate social responsibility into their supply chains, and how can tools like SHDB help address them?
From our perspective the biggest challenges companies face when trying to integrate social responsibility into supply chains are:
(1) Limited data accessibility beyond the Tier-1 suppliers
(2) Vast complexities of social issues
(3) Not knowing where to focus mitigation first.
Many companies still heavily rely on qualitative methods such as supplier interviews, and questionnaires. While these are valuable, they are also very time intensive and difficult to scale, especially when product supply chains span multiple countries. In contrast, social LCA is a quantitative, scalable, and systematic approach which analyses complete product value chains. However, the key bottleneck here is data. Companies might struggle with collecting consistent data across countries and sectors. This is where SHDB database helps. SHDB is based on a multi-region Input-Output (IO) modelling approach. It allows users to screen the entirety of upstream supply chains and helps them tackle situations where supplier-specific data is missing. Companies can thus confidently identify which countries and sectors are likely contributing most to social risks and which social themes in their supply chains demand deeper attention. Another challenge is prioritization of action. Even when companies are aware of social risks, they often struggle to decide the priority actions. SHDB offers a range of result views such as social footprint results, footprint by raw material breakdowns, and analyses of risk drivers and dominant contributors. These help users quickly translate findings and formulate risk mitigation strategies including targeted audits, supplier engagement plans, and stronger procurement policies.
In our recent work presented at the LCM2025 (Palermo), for example, we showed exactly how SHDB based screening in an S-LCA of hydrogen production can inform practical action metrics centred around not just companies but also the other stakeholders of government, researchers, and society.
Finally, we strongly believe that adoption of the SHDB tool is of prime importance. SHDB is integrated with the widely used platforms of Simapro and Openlca which makes it easier for LCA practitioners to adapt to.
- SHDB v6 comes with the Global Trade Analysis Project (GTAP) version 11, using 2017 as the primary reference year. What are the major advantages of using this version?
The major advantages of using SHDB version6 embedded with the GTAP 11 (2017 as the reference year) are:
- Up-to-date supply chain structure- When compared to the older GTAP reference years, 2017 reflects more recent production and trade patterns. This makes the SHDB’s upstream supply chain prediction even more recent and modern.
- Broader and detailed country/region coverage- GTAP11 has now extracted few sets of countries which were earlier embedded in regional aggregates. This complements for better and even more precise hotspot localization.
- Updated underlying IO model- GTAP11 brings a more strengthened IO table base years aligning to the closest GTAP reference year. This ensures that SHDB captures the most recent structural economic data for countries and regions.
- The categories Child labour, Forced labour and Wage have been updated; could you please explain how this update makes them more reliable and relevant for contemporary assessments?
Child labour, forced labour and wage are three of the most dynamic and material issues in supply chain due diligence. When we look at global evidence, we understand why updates to them matter so much. The International Labour Organisation (ILO) estimated around 160 million children were in child labour in 2020, up from about 152 million in 2016. Likewise, the ILO estimates indicate 50 million people were living in modern slavery in 2020, which is about 10 million more than in 2016 (when modern slavery was estimated at ~40.3 million). Since these risks are fluctuating over time, we wanted to include their refreshed risk level assignments in the database so that the v6 reflects the most current global understanding of these issues. For the version6 update we drew on the latest indices and evidence from sources like the ILO, UN/UNICEF, and the 2024 US. Department of Labour so that the characterization represents a snapshot of global conditions, trends and risk patterns related to child and forced labour.
These three themes are also central to procurement decisions and human rights reporting, so updating them makes assessments in the SHDB more reliable and contemporary. In short, the refreshed characterization helps ensure SHDB results align better with the current ‘real world’ risk signals.
- In SHDB v6, the wage and work-hour estimation models were revised. Could you explain the data sources and methodological adjustments introduced, and how these changes improve the reliability of social risk assessments across sectors and regions?
In SHDB, the worker hours model is responsible for converting the economic flows into labour intensity by using (a) wage payment rates from GTAP, and (b) externally sourced average wage statistics. The SHDB uses GTAP wage payments per unit of economic output and divides them by hourly wage rates to estimate worker hours for each country-sector.
The data sources in v6.2 include • Wage payments by country and sector which are sourced from GTAP11 MRIO, and • Wage rate statistics which are primarily compiled from ILO and United Nations Development Organization (UNIDO) wage statistics.
The v6.2 is equipped with the most recent wage statistics. The wage model in v6.2 was updated to ensure better coverage and consistency of wage rate data across countries and sectors which in turn supports more reliable worker hours estimates. Worker hours are the key activity variable SHDB uses to scale social risk across country-sector supply chains. We aimed for improvements in the wage model + worker hours since they directly translate into more robust labour intensity data thus supplementing defensible hotspots ranking.
- Social Life Cycle Assessment has evolved significantly in recent years. From your perspective, what are the most important developments in S-LCA, and how does SHDB v6 respond to or support these advancements?
S-LCAs have certainly evolved in the recent years. Major developments in the field have been towards the harmonization of S-LCA practice through the UNEP/SETAC 2020 Guidelines and the ISO 14075 publication in 2024. Along with this, a clear shift has occurred in how S-LCAs are used. A few years ago, it was often treated as a tool for informing more research. Whereas today, by virtue of the regulatory expectations and market demands, it is increasingly being applied as a tool for due diligence and action.
SHDB supports these developments through features designed for risk screening, social impact comparisons and decision support. One of the unique and recent additions in the database is the inclusion of normalization, which gives users the opportunity to interpret their results in a global context. By enabling comparison of a product’s results against global averages, users can analyse whether an identified hotspot is high relative to typical global patterns.
Given the rise of stronger standards and clearer guidance, the reliance on database assisted social risk screening has also increased. SHDB is built exactly to support such workflows. It is a one-of-a-kind database which embeds a consistent static MRIO model covering nearly 10,400 country-specific sectors (CSS) clubbed with social indicator data backed by both qualitative and quantitative assessments. We heavily emphasize on comprehensiveness, legitimacy, and reliability when selecting for inclusion in the database. SHDB is fully designed to establish baselines, and assessments that facilitate risk mitigation actions in areas where risk is most concentrated.