Primark

Is Primark ethical?

Our research highlights several ethical issues with Primark, including inadequate policies on animal welfare, failure to ensure workers’ rights in its supply chain, and its owners’ poor record on tackling climate change.

Below we outline some of these issues. To see the full detailed stories, and Primark’s overall ethical rating, please sign in or subscribe.

People

If we just looked at Primark’s policies it would appear to have a reasonably robust approach to workers’ rights. 

Its code of conduct requires suppliers to meet vital workers’ rights criteria, including payment of living wages and no discrimination. It has mapped 94% of its direct suppliers on its website, and says that it works with trade unions to ensure workplace representation. 

However, Primark faces multiple allegations suggesting that it has failed to live up to its policies.

In January 2023, the University of Aberdeen’s business school and the advocacy group Transform Trade published a report about the impact of clothes companies’ “unfair practices” on their suppliers in Bangladesh. According to the report:

"Suppliers mentioned major global brands including ASOS, H&M, Inditex/Zara, Next Primark, Aldi, Lidl, Asda/Walmart, New Look, Nike, Pep & Co, COSTCO, KIK and Bestseller as having the highest proportion of unfair practices, including cancellation of orders, price reductions, refusal to pay for goods dispatched/in production and/or delaying payment of invoices by more than three months."

In March 2022, workers also reported a number of violations at factories in Myanmar, that had previously or were currently in the Primark supply chain, including unfair dismissal and child labour. 

Primark responded to the allegations in November 2023. It stated that it had ended its relationship with a number of factories prior to the allegations, and was investigating several other issues. 

Primark does not appear to have a policy prohibiting the use of cotton from the Xinjiang Autonomous Region of China, where the state is known to force members of the Uyghur ethnic minority to work in the cotton industry. 
 

Animals

Primark receives 0/100 in Ethical Consumer’s animals category. 

The brand sells animal products including leather, feathers and wool. Ethical Consumer searched for animal welfare policies relating to these products and found that the company had some policies in place preventing the worst welfare outcomes for the animals involved, but these were not comprehensive. A significant amount of its animal products were not covered by adequate policies.

Ethical Consumer also found animal rights issues with Primark’s owner, Associated British Foods (ABF), which sells meat and dairy products such as bacon and ham via a number of ABF's other brands. It did not have a policy prohibiting factory farming.

Environment

Primark’s owner Associated British Foods (ABF) performs poorly when it comes to tackling climate change. While the company is taking some steps to reduce its emissions – such as purchasing renewable energy and installing onsite solar, it does not report on the largest share of its emissions which come from its supply chain.

In its Responsibility Report, ABF states, “Many of our businesses are in the process of calculating their wider Scope 3 emissions, focusing initially on their supply chains. Primark completed this process in 2021 and is currently implementing plans to support its suppliers and partners to reduce their GHG emissions in line with its reduction target". However, Ethical Consumer expects massive multinationals like ABF to be taking steps across all their businesses.

While the company said that it was “working towards an ambition to achieve net zero by 2050 or sooner”, it did not lay out clear interim targets and its ambition had not been certified as in line with international climate goals.
 

Politics

The company also does not have a good track record when it comes to financial ethics. 

ABF has several subsidiaries in countries considered by Ethical Consumer to be tax havens, including Mauritius, the Netherlands and Ireland, that do not appear to serve the local population. It does not have clear policy prohibiting tax avoidance in its Tax Strategy, and has not provided an explanation about the role of these subsidiaries. 

The text above was written June 2024, and most research was conducted in November and December 2023.