ACC9027M Sustainability Reporting and Business Ethics Assignment Sample

Here’s the best sample of ACC9027M Sustainability Reporting and Business Ethics Assignment. 

Corporate  social responsibility (CSR) and sustainability  practices for Sainsbury’s Plc

It has been defined as the operations of a company that have a good influence on individuals and the surrounding community, in accordance with one definition. The definition of corporate social responsibility (CSR) is still up for dispute, with some arguing that it is a kind of self-interest, philanthropy, or “enlightened self-interest” (a combination of both). 2 A more in-depth examination of Sainsbury’s corporate social responsibility (CSR) approach will be conducted in this research, which has been specifically developed to do so. A comparison between reports on Sainsbury’s corporate website and tales published in earned media is conducted, and the findings are startling. Due to the fact that it represents the thoughts and judgments of individuals who are not linked with Sainsbury’s Corporation, earned media is seen as more trustworthy. The theory of public relations developed by Peach is used to determine whether or not the policy is still relevant in today’s information-rich society.

“Piggly Wiggly” was founded in 1916 by Clarence Saunders, a grocer from Memphis, Tennessee, who built the first of what would become the world’s biggest chain of self-service grocery stores, called “Piggly Wiggly,” at what is now known as “Piggly Wiggly” shopping centre. Following then, the company went on to become the world’s largest self-service supermarket chain, according to Forbes magazine.. Hamstra (2019) views the present supermarket as a “model for self-service food purchasing” that was “credited with establishing” by Saunders in the early twentieth century. Saunders is also “credited with creating” the notion of self-service food purchase, which was first introduced in the 1970s. If it weren’t for Saunders, it has been proposed by Hamstra (2019) that the current status of the food retailing industry would be quite different. Construction of self-service shops was his concept, with the goal of revolutionising the way grocery stores worked.

Social

According to the British Museum, individual stores, new self-service restaurants, and the country’s first supermarkets, all of which began appearing in the mid- to late-1950s, were among the characteristics of typical high streets in the United Kingdom in 1955, when the country’s first supermarkets began appearing (Hamlett, Alexander, Bailey, & Shaw, 2020). According to Tesco, the company’s record-breaking £3.8 billion profit reported in 2019 amounted to about £10 million in profit every day since then, which is nearly double the national average. After increasing exponentially in the year 2019, this rate has continued to climb at this rate ever since (Hawkes, 2019). In his research, Peat (2019) discovered that consumers now contribute 58 cents for every pound spent in the retail business, which they feel is already being paid to merchants such as Tesco and Sainsbury’s. As Peat (2019) points out, this is an increase from 46p a decade earlier, indicating that significant growth levels in the retail industry have been sustained for a significant period of time after its creation. Together, this information provides an understanding of the scope and importance of the retail business in general, and supermarkets in particular.

The term “resell price maintenance” refers to an arrangement in which an upstream firm attempts to influence the pricing of its commodities by a downstream business (RPM). Another way to say it is that makers of branded goods want that merchants sell their items at or above a certain price in order to maintain their profits. During the first decade of the twentieth century, RPM was one of the most influential factors in the development of supermarkets in the United Kingdom, particularly in the city.

Economic

Customers would save time by avoiding the need to shop around for the best deal as a result of RPM’s ability to prohibit retailers from participating in price wars and competing against one another in a “race to the bottom,” as a result of the ability to prohibit retailers from participating in price wars and competing against one another in a “race to the bottom.” However, there are several disadvantages to resale price maintenance (RPM), including the fact that it artificially inflates prices, which may reduce consumer surplus, as well as the fact that it may reduce manufacturers’ incentives to remain internationally competitive as a result of the artificially high pricing levels. One of RPM’s most important responsibilities was to protect small merchants against price-cutting by a huge number of rivals, which was one of the most difficult duties. In the wake of Sir Jack Cohen’s successful lobbying campaign in Parliament for the abolition of RPM, the power of large supermarkets over small businesses has been even more apparent.

In recent years, there has been a significant slowdown in the growth of retail stores nationwide. In response to the proliferation of low-cost supermarkets in the United Kingdom, the “big four” supermarkets (Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Asda, and Morrison) have seen a slowdown in overall revenue growth. Although discounters are gaining market share at the expense of the big four supermarkets, West (2014) points out that Aldi and Lidl have seen record sales increases in addition to market share gains, as shown in the figure to the right.

Skye predicted that the world’s population will reach more over 10 billion people by 2100, representing a huge rise from the current 7.5 billion people (2019). Sustainable development, according to him, is essential in order to avoid the world’s population from overpopulating in the future. An further persuasive argument in favour of long-term development is the enormous increase in the global population that has occurred over the previous few decades. It is now more necessary than ever to pursue sustainable development, especially in light of the “accelerating pace of climate change” (Carana, 2014). According to the International Energy Agency, climate change is compounding the situation in unexpected ways by 2030, following Sir John Beddington’s warning that dwindling energy supplies and food shortages will result in a crisis with grave repercussions due to the demand for resources. The International Energy Agency says that climate change is compounding the situation in unexpected ways by 2030. Reduced energy supplies and food shortages, as predicted by Sir John Beddington, would result in a crisis with catastrophic ramifications as a consequence of increased demand for resources, with climate change exacerbate the situation in unexpected ways (Rohwer,, 2019).

Issues reporting CSR and sustainability practices

supermarkets have a variety of issues that must be addressed if they are to retain their long-term profitability.

It has been more important as a distribution route for agricultural goods in recent years, ranging from fresh vegetables cultivated by farmers to meals prepared by multinational businesses, and it is anticipated to keep this position in the foreseeable future (Stichele, 2021). Additional challenges associated with sustainability exist for supermarkets, including those relating to packaging and waste management, transportation, and energy use; systemic issues about social fairness and compensation; and broader concerns about consumer consumption.

Consider whether or not Hopkins (2014) has a genuine point of criticism given that the supermarket model is essentially unsustainable. He also makes informed assumptions about what a more long-term and sustainable manner of production would look like in the future. The Sustainable Development Commission published a report in 2020 stating that many supermarket practises are unjust, damaging, and unsustainable. According to the report, Those who are worried about the findings of this investigation should be encouraged to express their concerns. If the government does not make a concerted effort to harness the power of supermarkets, according to a study of laws that have an impact on supermarkets, it will be impossible to fully address the concerns of obesity and waste, climate change, and fair trade. A further claim made by Balch (2014) is that narrow profit margins will limit food producers’ ability to cope with illness and the consequences of climate change, resulting in the phase-out of environmentally friendly production techniques in favour of environmentally destructive, but (temporarily) lucrative monoculture agriculture (see Figure 1). This is a very crucial element to keep in mind while making a decision.

Certain supermarkets, for example, have increased their efforts in the field of sustainability after the release of that research. One of the aims of the supermarket chain’s $1 billion sustainability strategy is to achieve new environmental targets by the end of 2020, such as cutting carbon emissions and reducing the use of packaging materials, among other things (Nichols, 2019).

It is the purpose of this section to offer an overview of environmental management systems.

An environmental management system (EMS) allows organisations to reduce their environmental impact while simultaneously increasing the efficiency of their operations by implementing one (United States Environmental Protection Agency, 2019). As stated by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (2019), this is achieved by the establishment of a “framework that assists a firm in fulfilling environmental goals through the consistent management of its activities.” There are several benefits to implementing an environmental management system, and these benefits are discussed in further depth in the next section (EMS).

The ISO 26000 standard for environmental management is the focus of this research, and it will be examined in depth. This standard does not require that an environmental management system be certified in order to be in compliance with it; rather, it is an ISO standard that strives to establish a shared sense of social responsibility by concentrating on seven basic challenges that affect all organisations (ISO, 2014). ISO is an acronym for the International Standards Organization, which was founded in 1947. (International Organization for Standardization, 2014). In recent years, an increasing number of businesses have recognised the importance of socially responsible behaviour in the workplace, and many have begun to incorporate it into their daily operations (ISO, 2014). Although some businesses and organisations may be deterred from adopting the ISO 26000 standard because it is not yet certified, those who do so for more legitimate reasons may benefit from it in other ways. For example, ISO 26000 can assist organisations in engaging stakeholders and identifying social responsibility priorities that can be implemented across the organisation (Campbell, 2019).

The role of the company directors

This research is being carried out in order to bridge a knowledge gap that presently exists on how environmental regulations are applied in the grocery business in the United Kingdom. Another cause is a scarcity of environmental standards literature, which is notably deficient in case studies drawn from real-world circumstances, which is a contributing factor. As they claim in their essay, ethical considerations and corporate social responsibility (CSR) are not widely addressed in the retail business, and that this is an issue for the industry as a whole (2021). As a result of this investigation, we will be able to obtain a deeper understanding of the many components that make up the retail business. In order to differentiate themselves from one another, direct competitors employ a wide range of complicated and subtle differentiation techniques, such as participation in CSR, about which “very little is known about how these choices are made in practise, particularly in a competitive setting,” according to the authors (Ellickson & Misra, 2020).

As a result, this research will examine environmental standards from both theoretical and practical perspectives in order to gain a better understanding of how environmental standards are used as part of corporate social responsibility strategies, which, according to the World Resources Institute, are becoming an increasingly “integral component of an organization’s relationship with its stakeholders” (Walsh D. , 2019). Despite this, there is still a “widespread misunderstanding by both customers and company employees” when it comes to corporate social responsibility (also known as corporate social responsibility, or CSR) (Tyrrell, 2020).

Moreover, according to Tyrrell, little research has been done on corporate social responsibility (CSR) from a business aspect (2020).

As defined by global business leaders, corporate social responsibility is a long-term, on-going commitment to ethical business practises in a way that benefits not only the firm’s own employees and their families, but also the local community and society as a whole, rather than just the firm’s own shareholders and shareholders’ families (CSR). Specifically, according to the European Commission (2019), corporate social responsibility (CSR) is defined as ‘the duty of businesses for their impacts on society, as well as the specific actions that businesses should undertake in order to fulfil their promise.’

The process through which companies conduct their business operations in order to have a positive impact on society as a whole is described by Baker (2015) as corporate social responsibility (CSR). McWilliams and Siegel define corporate social responsibility (CSR) as those behaviours that seem to provide some societal benefit in addition to those activities that are in the best interests of the corporation and those that are mandated by law (2021). Van Marrewijk (2021) defines “corporate social responsibility” (CSR) as efforts performed by businesses to show the integration of social and environmental considerations into their operations and relationships with stakeholders. The operations of nature are, by definition, completely beneficial to the environment. For Carroll (1979), “corporate social responsibility encompasses the legal, ethical, and discretionary [later known as philanthropic] duties that society imposes on organisations at any given point in time.

As noted by several scholars, including Dahlsrud (2020), the fact that there are so many distinct meanings of corporate social responsibility makes it difficult for individuals to participate in meaningful debates when competing interpretations contain varying levels of bias makes it difficult for individuals to participate in meaningful debates. In both the business and academic sectors, corporate social responsibility (CSR) is still inadequately defined and executed, and there is a large amount of misunderstanding about how it should be defined and applied, according to the World Bank.

An Overview of ISO 26000 in a Nutshell (2.3 ISO 26000)

In order to ensure that products and services are safe and reliable, environmental standards have been devised, while also promoting free and fair global trade for businesses throughout the globe (ISO, 2014). Maintaining awareness of the fact that the ISO 26000 social responsibility standard is not a collection of regulations that must be followed by an organisation or business in order to be in compliance with the standard is important. Several other major ISO standards, such as the ISO 14001 series on environmental management and the ISO 9001 series on quality management, have used the ISO 26000 standard as their starting point and changed it accordingly. Numerous components from ISO 26000 have been included into these standards and changed to satisfy the requirements of the respective standards bodies.

It is possible for organisations to use the ISO 26000 standard to assist them in the design, implementation, enhancement, and maintenance of a social responsibility framework that takes into account the implications, interests, and expectations of the people who work for them (Madrid, 2019). Implications of Madrid (2019): The ISO 26000 standard addresses seven essential topics: corporate governance; human rights; labour practises; the environment; fair business practises for customers; involvement and development of communities; community engagement; development of communities; engagement and development of communities; engagement and development of communities (as applicable). These are the seven fundamental challenges addressed by ISO 26000, and they are stated in the following section. The triple bottom line (TBL), which was first proposed by John Elkington and later developed by the University of California at Berkeley, is a method of measuring sustainability that was established by the University of California at Berkeley. Because the TBL factored in environmental and ethical considerations when calculating profit and shareholder value, it went above and beyond the traditional measures of profit, return on investment, and shareholder value to achieve greater success (Hall & Slaper, 2019). There are three areas of performance that should be considered when evaluating a company’s overall performance: social, environmental, and financial performance. As a result, since each dimension of the TBL does not have a common unit of measurement, it is difficult to quantitatively describe the TBL in any meaningful manner. Experts have advocated for the monetization of all aspects of the TBL, which would result in a single unit of measurement, as proposed by certain experts. The concept of valuing wetlands or endangered species is controversial, and it is clear why some people are opposed to it (Hall & Slaper, 2019).

Conclusion

The TBL, according to study, can be concluded in a variety of ways depending on how the results of the three categories are evaluated; however, they propose that the TBL be computed using an index in order to avoid the problem of units that are incompatible with one another; and they assert that this index will also include economic, social, and environmental aspects as an additional feature, in addition to other variables. Economic, social, and environmental development are measured using the Genuine Progress Indicator (GPI), which may be used in combination with the Gross Domestic Product to determine overall development (GDP).

Toyo Tyson (2010) asserts that the value of TBL is greater than it has ever been, and CEOs of public firms have a unique challenge in trying to please investors while also impressing their grandchildren. The ability to leave the world a better place than you left it while making a livelihood may pave the way for more profitable and successful companies in the future. Because there is no globally approved approach for analysing TBL, it may be beneficial to explore customising the underlying framework for different organisations, projects, and geographical locations. As a result of its use in this manner, TBL may be used to analyse the impact of an individual effort or a broad variety of conditions, such as analysing the effects of an initiative over a large geographic region (Hall & Slaper, 2019).

References

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