Our mission and values are articulated by Merck's corporate safety and environmental (S&E) policies. In addition to compliance with all applicable country, regional and local safety and environmental laws, we strive for S&E performance that is among the best in the pharmaceutical industry.

Merck's commitment to S&E begins with Merck's Executive Committee, which:

• Sets the strategic direction for S&E within the Company and its divisions;
• Establishes long-term S&E goals and short-term objectives and metrics for the Company and individual divisions; 
• Periodically assesses progress against those measures, both as members of Executive Committee and as division leaders; and
• Allocates resources and takes S&E performance into account when determining divisional and individual compensation and awards.

Merck's Vice President of Global Safety and the Environment is responsible for communicating to Executive Committee our progress on S&E goals, objectives and metrics and other material issues, as well as recommending long- and short-term goals, objectives and metrics.

Delivery of S&E performance is shared among corporate S&E professionals, site S&E professionals and the Merck operations.

Our corporate S&E organization is responsible for:

• Developing corporate policies, procedures, guidelines and standards, as well as tools and programs to support and drive S&E performance and implementation of compliance requirements;
• Providing technical and regulatory support to the site safety and environmental groups and operating organizations; 
• Auditing Merck's operating organizations to ensure that appropriate programs are in place to ensure compliance, employee safety and environmental protection;
• Looking both externally and internally for emerging trends, issues and practices that should be addressed in our operating organizations; and
• Anticipating, tracking and commenting on new regulations.

Our site and operating area S&E professionals are responsible for implementing S&E programs and supporting the S&E needs of their areas, which may include manufacturing, research operations, sales and administrative activities, by:

• Ensuring that operations fully understand S&E requirements;
• Establishing, assessing and improving S&E programs;
• Providing S&E regulatory and technical support to employees and the operating areas;
• Routinely assessing the performance of the operating area against both regulatory and Merck requirements; and
• Acting as the primary liaison with local regulators and inspectors.

The Merck operations are responsible for compliance with all regulatory requirements and applicable Merck internal requirements.

This section highlights our recent S&E program initiatives:

Policies, Procedures and Guidelines

Merck's policies, procedures and guidelines (PPGs) provide clear direction to our sites and operating organizations regarding expectations for S&E processes and program implementation. PPGs play a critical role in the classic management construct of  "plan, do, check, act."  They bridge the "planning" of management (goals, objectives, metrics) with the "doing" of the sites and operating organizations. They also help bridge the discovery of gaps in "checking" (auditing) by providing guidance on how to "act" to close those gaps.   

Merck PPGs and Environmental Management System programs are reviewed by our Environmental, Safety and Health Operational and Technical Committee (ESHOT), comprised of Corporate S&E staff, legal and representatives from each of the operating organizations. ESHOT ensures that new or revised internal requirements not only comply with legal requirements and help ensure a safe, healthful and environmentally responsible workplace, but also are practical, cost-effective and meet the needs of all stakeholders.

Internal Auditing Program

For more than 20 years, Merck has conducted corporate safety and environmental audits of our facilities worldwide. All manufacturing and research sites are audited. Those sites are typically audited every two or three years, whereas lower risk sites are audited less frequently. In many cases, particularly outside of the United States, our internal auditors work with consultants who have regulatory expertise in the laws of the host country. In addition, each of our operating sites must perform periodic self-evaluations using formal compliance tools. To continue to drive improvements, we recently enhanced our corporate audit practices to make our audits more detailed and rigorous, helping us better identify compliance and performance issues.

• We have expanded our core auditor pool to include additional staff members with extensive subject matter expertise. 
• In early 2008, both existing and new S&E auditors received expanded and enhanced training in auditing procedures, regulatory requirements and hazard recognition.
• We are also placing an increased emphasis on rapid resolution of all identified compliance issues — those identified during audits or by any other means.
• Findings from our audit program are also used to alert other Merck Environmental Health & Safety (EHS) managers to potential EHS compliance concerns.

Training

Training is critical to ensuring that our managers, our EHS staff and our employees worldwide understand their role in driving EHS performance and have the knowledge and skills to fulfill their responsibilities. In 2008, we increased our emphasis on EHS training across the company in three areas: Senior Operating Leaders, EHS Professionals, and Employees.

In 2008, we launched a new EHS Leadership Training program for senior operations managers to enable them to play a more meaningful and visible role in supporting EHS programs. This training covers management responsibilities for compliance, as well as management's role in conducting EHS inspections, driving closure of findings, contributing to incident investigations and communicating more effectively about EHS. Over 500 operations leaders have already been trained globally and we plan to expand this training to the supervisor level as well.

Training of EHS professionals was also significantly enhanced as we established standard curricula to help drive more consistent technical training and improve our EHS support capabilities around the world. The curriculum addresses technical training needs from core fundamentals through to expert level topics. This curriculum, which includes cross training opportunities, will help us develop our EHS professionals at all levels of the organization. Most courses are delivered in person by internal subject matter experts or by approved external trainers.

Finally, Merck established consistent and comprehensive EHS training expectations for all roles globally to help sites improve identification of employee training needs on key EHS topics. Completion of employee EHS training is now an element on the divisional EHS scorecards. Management is held accountable to ensure EHS training is completed so all Merck employees are well prepared to do their jobs safely while protecting the environment. Over 141,000 training units were completed in 2008.

The content on this page was last modified on September 15, 2009.

Merck & Co., Inc., Whitehouse Station, NJ, USA, and Schering-Plough Corporation, Kenilworth, NJ, USA, are now one company. We have combined our global operations under the name Merck & Co., Inc. We are working to update our corporate responsibility Web site to reflect our new, combined, global organization.