Minority procurement needed down the chain.(Opinion)(minority-owned auto suppliers)

Crain's Detroit Business, July, 2004

Leaders among minority-owned auto suppliers are alarmed that tier-one suppliers aren't embracing minority procurement programs as readily as the automakers who first created them. (See story, Page 1.) The auto industry has supported minority-procurement initiatives for more than 30 years.

Those initiatives have helped to build some thriving minority-owned enterprises in Detroit and around the country. Ford Motor Co. alone spent $3 billion with 300 minority suppliers in 2003. Ford also requires its tier-one suppliers to develop diversity purchasing programs that would result in an additional $1.2 billion in purchasing. But are suppliers embracing the concept? Some are. Johnson Controls Inc. was named Corporation of the Year last year by the National...

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