Compliance

Our compliance system creates the organisational prerequisites for making sure that the given applicable law, our internal regulations and guidelines as well as those regulatory standards recognised by the Company are known across the Group and compliance to be monitored. This is not only in order to avoid risks involving liability, penalties and fines together with other financial disadvantages for the Company, but also to ensure the positive perception of the Company and its employees by the public.

The Board of Executive Directors has entrusted a Chief Compliance Officer with coordinating and documenting compliance activities across the Group. He heads up the central Compliance Committee, which includes the Compliance Officers of the holding units and business segments as well as the heads of those holding units that perform tasks relevant to compliance (auditing, risk management, law, human resources, environmental protection/work safety/quality management, business organisation, data protection and IT security). The Audit Committee of the Supervisory Board concerns itself regularly with key compliance matters of the K+S Group.

Every employee is made familiar with the core values and the Code of Conduct that apply throughout the Group as well as with the resultant corporate guidelines. Obligatory training sessions for (potentially) affected employees are held in relation to specific issues (e.g. anti-trust law, anti-corruption measures, environmental protection/work safety laws). The employees have the opportunity to obtain advice on matters relevant to compliance via internal hotlines. The setting up of external hotlines (whistleblowing) has been planned for 2010.

Compliance violations are pursued and punished systematically. In 2009, we did not identify any such violations.