Speaker Info

Matthew Wenban-Smith
Policy & Standards Director, ResponsibleSteel

Matthew Wenban-Smith has worked in the area of voluntary sustainability standards and conformity assessment since 1994, when he was taken on by the newly established Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) to set up its accreditation programme. He left FSC in 2006 and founded the independent consultancy OneWorldStandards, providing services to established and emerging sustainability standards initiatives, their clients and stakeholders.

Matthew has worked on a range of projects in the mining, minerals and metals sectors, including work for the Alliance for Responsible Mining (ARM); on the establishment of the Initiative for Responsible Mining Assurance (IRMA); a review of standards initiatives in the mining sector for WWF; and more recently as a lead author for the IISD State of Sustainability Initiatives report ‘Standards and the Extractive Economy’.  He has been working on the ResponsibleSteel programme to maximise steel’s contribution to a sustainable society since 2017.