Ethics in Operations (AQA A Level Business): Exam Questions

Source B: Primark

Primark sells clothing at prices far below most of the high street. It is owned by Associated British Foods, and in the 52 weeks to 13 September 2025 it had revenue of £9 489 million and an adjusted operating profit of £1 126 million.

Selling cheap clothing in very large quantities raises two questions that the company is asked constantly: who made it, and what it does to the planet.

On the first, Primark does not own the factories that make its clothes. It buys from suppliers, mostly in Asia, and checks them. More than 120 of its own specialists are based in the main countries it buys from, and together with approved third-party auditors they carry out over 3 000 audits a year. Every tier one factory approved to make Primark products is audited at least once a year, and most audits are unannounced.

On the second, it has set out what it has changed. 74% of its clothing is now made with recycled or more sustainably sourced fibres, up from 66% in 2023. 57% of its clothing contains cotton that is organic, recycled or grown through the Primark Cotton Project, and over 90% of the farmers in that project have adopted at least two regenerative farming practices on at least 30% of their land. Every clothing, textile and footwear supplier is now on its traceability programme. Emissions across the whole value chain are down 5.7% against 2019, with the emissions Primark controls directly down 71% and those in its supply chain down 4%.

That last pair of figures is the difficulty in one line. The part Primark can change itself has almost gone. The part it cannot has barely moved.

Source: Associated British Foods annual results 2025 and Primark Sustainability and Ethics Progress Report

Appendix E: Selected data for Primark, 52 weeks to 13 September 2025

Source: Associated British Foods

Appendix G: How Primark checks the factories that make its clothes

Source: Analyst

Assess whether auditing suppliers is enough to make Primark's supply chain ethical.

Source B: Unilever

Unilever makes soap, shampoo, washing powder, ice cream, tea and stock cubes, under about 400 brands sold in more than 190 countries. Turnover in 2024 was 60.8 billion euros, up 1.9%, and it employs around 120 000 people.

It is also one of the most closely watched companies in the world on sustainability, and it publishes figures most businesses would not. In 2024, 97% of its order volumes of palm oil, paper and board, tea, soy and cocoa were deforestation-free, and 79% of its key crops were sourced sustainably. It has cut its use of new plastic by 23% since 2019 against a target of 40% by 2028, and recycled material now makes up 21% of the plastic it uses. Emissions from its own operations are 72% lower than in 2015.

What those numbers hide is how little of it Unilever does itself. Almost all of its emissions arise somewhere other than its own factories, in the fields where its crops are grown and the lorries and homes at either end of its products' lives. Its key crops come from more than a hundred countries, and some of them are grown by farms too small to appear on any list.

That is why the supplier code of conduct matters. Every supplier signs it, and a share of them are audited each year. Most of those audits are arranged in advance.

The question the company keeps being asked is whether signing a code and visiting a fraction of suppliers on an agreed date tells anyone very much about conditions in a field eight thousand miles away.

Source: Unilever Annual Report and Accounts 2024

Appendix F: How far Unilever has got, and what makes the rest difficult

Percentages

Source: Analyst

Appendix G: Unilever's suppliers and how they are checked

Source: Analyst

Assess how well Unilever's supplier code of conduct protects the people who work in its supply chain.

Calculate the total variable cost of auditing Unilever's suppliers during the year to support your answer.

Source B: Severnside Plastics Ltd

Severnside Plastics Ltd makes rigid plastic trays and pots for food manufacturers from a single factory in Gloucestershire. It employs 165 people, had revenue of £27.3 million in the year to March 2025 and an operating profit of £1.42 million. Twenty-three customers buy from it, and the four largest account for 61% of revenue.

The company uses 7 400 tonnes of polymer a year, of which 1 480 tonnes is recycled. Those four largest customers have told Severnside that from next year they will only buy packaging with at least 30% recycled content, so the company has to find more recycled material or lose nearly two thirds of its sales.

Recycled polymer is harder to work with than new polymer. It costs £310 a tonne more, only about two thirds of what the company needs is available in the United Kingdom, and it varies more in quality: when recycled content goes above 25%, the share of batches rejected rises to 3.1%. Because the trays hold food, every batch has to pass a food-contact safety test, and the company ran 1 840 of those last year.

There is also the question of where the material comes from. Severnside has a written supplier code, but it reaches only its six direct polymer suppliers, it audited two of them last year, and the original source of most of its recycled material cannot be traced.

The board has to decide how to get to 30%.

Source: Severnside Plastics Ltd

Appendix E: Severnside Plastics Ltd selected data, year to March 2025

Source: Severnside Plastics Ltd

Appendix G: How Severnside checks its suppliers and its products

Source: Analyst

Assess whether Severnside Plastics Ltd knows enough about its suppliers.

Source B: Calder Vale Coffee Roasters Ltd

Calder Vale Coffee Roasters Ltd roasts coffee for cafés and food retailers from one roastery near Skipton. It employs 84 people, roasts about 1 850 tonnes of green beans a year, and in the year to March 2025 had revenue of £19.6 million and an operating profit of £1.35 million. It has been trading for twenty-nine years and supplies 240 customers.

The beans come from eleven co-operatives in four countries. Calder Vale pays £4 920 a tonne when the market price is £4 500, not under any certification scheme but under its own agreement with the growers, and it tells customers so. It visited seven of the eleven co-operatives last year and can name the farm of origin for 83% of what it buys.

Roasting coffee is a gas-fired business. Of the 2 775 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent the company produced last year, the largest share came from the three roasters themselves rather than from shipping beans halfway round the world. The oldest roaster is twenty-two years old.

Packaging is the other half of the environmental question, and the harder half to move. Forty-six per cent of what Calder Vale packs can be recycled at home and none of it is reused, because a bag of coffee is normally thrown away once it is empty.

A second roastery has been agreed in principle, and the board also has to decide what to do about the emissions it already has.

Source: Calder Vale Coffee Roasters Ltd

Appendix E: Calder Vale Coffee Roasters Ltd selected data, year to March 2025

Source: Calder Vale Coffee Roasters Ltd

Appendix F: Where the beans come from, and what Calder Vale pays for them

Green beans bought each year, tonnes

Source: Analyst

Assess whether Calder Vale Coffee Roasters Ltd knows enough about where its coffee comes from.

Source A: Dalmuir Shipworks Ltd

Dalmuir Shipworks Ltd repairs ships and offshore vessels in three dry berths on the Clyde. The yard has been working for ninety-six years, employs 290 people and had revenue of £42.8 million in the year to March 2025, with an operating profit of £2.3 million.

Seventy-eight per cent of the workforce is in the union, which appoints six safety representatives. They stopped work twenty-three times last year. There is a written safety procedure signed off with the union, nine reportable injuries were recorded, and 435 working days were lost to injury.

Because the yard employs more than 250 people it has to publish its gender pay gap, and the figures are uncomfortable reading. Thirty-two of the 290 employees are women, which is 11%. The median hourly rate for men is £19.20 and for women £16.32. Women make up 24% of the lowest-paid quarter of employees and 2% of the highest-paid quarter. None of the fourteen supervisors is a woman, and men are far more likely than women to receive a bonus.

The commercial problem is different and just as hard. The three berths are only full three days in four. A third of the yard's revenue comes from work that arrives at short notice, which is exactly the work that needs an empty berth, and the only ways of filling the gaps are to work through the night or to stop taking short-notice jobs at all.

The board is reviewing both the pay figures and the berths this spring.

Source: Dalmuir Shipworks Ltd

Appendix A: Dalmuir Shipworks Ltd selected data, year to March 2025

Source: Dalmuir Shipworks Ltd

Appendix C: How the yard works, and what lost time costs

Source: Analyst

Assess whether Dalmuir Shipworks Ltd does enough to keep the people working in its yard safe.

Source B: Unilever

Unilever makes soap, shampoo, washing powder, ice cream, tea and stock cubes, under about 400 brands sold in more than 190 countries. Turnover in 2024 was 60.8 billion euros, up 1.9%, and it employs around 120 000 people.

It is also one of the most closely watched companies in the world on sustainability, and it publishes figures most businesses would not. In 2024, 97% of its order volumes of palm oil, paper and board, tea, soy and cocoa were deforestation-free, and 79% of its key crops were sourced sustainably. It has cut its use of new plastic by 23% since 2019 against a target of 40% by 2028, and recycled material now makes up 21% of the plastic it uses. Emissions from its own operations are 72% lower than in 2015.

What those numbers hide is how little of it Unilever does itself. Almost all of its emissions arise somewhere other than its own factories, in the fields where its crops are grown and the lorries and homes at either end of its products' lives. Its key crops come from more than a hundred countries, and some of them are grown by farms too small to appear on any list.

That is why the supplier code of conduct matters. Every supplier signs it, and a share of them are audited each year. Most of those audits are arranged in advance.

The question the company keeps being asked is whether signing a code and visiting a fraction of suppliers on an agreed date tells anyone very much about conditions in a field eight thousand miles away.

Source: Unilever Annual Report and Accounts 2024

Appendix F: How far Unilever has got, and what makes the rest difficult

Source: Analyst

Appendix H: Two ways of improving how suppliers are checked

Cost of one audit: 940 euros

Source: Analyst

Unilever is considering two ways of improving how its suppliers are checked:

Option 1: audit every supplier at least once every three years

Option 2: cut the supplier list from 48 000 to 20 000 and work closely with those that remain

Evaluate both options and recommend which one Unilever should choose.

Calculate the total costs of auditing in the first year under each option to support your answer.

Source B: Severnside Plastics Ltd

Severnside Plastics Ltd makes rigid plastic trays and pots for food manufacturers from a single factory in Gloucestershire. It employs 165 people, had revenue of £27.3 million in the year to March 2025 and an operating profit of £1.42 million. Twenty-three customers buy from it, and the four largest account for 61% of revenue.

The company uses 7 400 tonnes of polymer a year, of which 1 480 tonnes is recycled. Those four largest customers have told Severnside that from next year they will only buy packaging with at least 30% recycled content, so the company has to find more recycled material or lose nearly two thirds of its sales.

Recycled polymer is harder to work with than new polymer. It costs £310 a tonne more, only about two thirds of what the company needs is available in the United Kingdom, and it varies more in quality: when recycled content goes above 25%, the share of batches rejected rises to 3.1%. Because the trays hold food, every batch has to pass a food-contact safety test, and the company ran 1 840 of those last year.

There is also the question of where the material comes from. Severnside has a written supplier code, but it reaches only its six direct polymer suppliers, it audited two of them last year, and the original source of most of its recycled material cannot be traced.

The board has to decide how to get to 30%.

Source: Severnside Plastics Ltd

Appendix E: Severnside Plastics Ltd selected data, year to March 2025

Source: Severnside Plastics Ltd

Appendix F: The polymer Severnside uses, and what 30% would take

Polymer used each year, tonnes

Source: Analyst

Appendix G: How Severnside checks its suppliers and its products

Source: Analyst

Evaluate two steps Severnside Plastics Ltd could take to keep its trays safe as recycled content rises, and recommend which one it should do first.

Source B: Calder Vale Coffee Roasters Ltd

Calder Vale Coffee Roasters Ltd roasts coffee for cafés and food retailers from one roastery near Skipton. It employs 84 people, roasts about 1 850 tonnes of green beans a year, and in the year to March 2025 had revenue of £19.6 million and an operating profit of £1.35 million. It has been trading for twenty-nine years and supplies 240 customers.

The beans come from eleven co-operatives in four countries. Calder Vale pays £4 920 a tonne when the market price is £4 500, not under any certification scheme but under its own agreement with the growers, and it tells customers so. It visited seven of the eleven co-operatives last year and can name the farm of origin for 83% of what it buys.

Roasting coffee is a gas-fired business. Of the 2 775 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent the company produced last year, the largest share came from the three roasters themselves rather than from shipping beans halfway round the world. The oldest roaster is twenty-two years old.

Packaging is the other half of the environmental question, and the harder half to move. Forty-six per cent of what Calder Vale packs can be recycled at home and none of it is reused, because a bag of coffee is normally thrown away once it is empty.

A second roastery has been agreed in principle, and the board also has to decide what to do about the emissions it already has.

Source: Calder Vale Coffee Roasters Ltd

Appendix E: Calder Vale Coffee Roasters Ltd selected data, year to March 2025

Source: Calder Vale Coffee Roasters Ltd

Appendix F: Where the beans come from, and what Calder Vale pays for them

Green beans bought each year, tonnes

Source: Analyst

Evaluate two ways in which Calder Vale Coffee Roasters Ltd could give its customers more confidence that the growers it buys from are paid fairly, and recommend which one it should do first.