Business Ethics Assessment: Nike's Sustainability Claims Report

This report provides a critical analysis of Nike's sustainability claims, examining its environmental and social responsibility initiatives. It explores Nike's efforts to reduce its carbon footprint, manage waste, and protect water resources. The report also investigates the ethical concerns surrounding Nike's labor practices, particularly the use of sweatshops in developing countries, and the company's response to these criticisms. The report highlights Nike's Future Varsity program and other social programs while also addressing the issues of worker exploitation, discrimination, and working conditions. The report recommends that Nike conduct regular audits of its factories, provide worker compensation, and minimize the use of non-renewable resources. Ultimately, the report assesses the effectiveness of Nike's sustainability strategy in achieving its goals and maintaining its market leadership. The report uses secondary data to explore Nike's sustainability efforts, including its environmental impact, labor practices, and ethical considerations. It also discusses the impact of anti-sweatshop rallies on Nike's brand image and offers recommendations for improvement.

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Introduction
In the present business world, market is getting shrink due to entry of a large number of
organization in the same market. Understand the profit related to that particular market every
organization is trying to gain major shareholding in order to remain at the top position of the
business market. In this situation, one of the most significant aspects which can maintain the
growth and development of the organization is its sustainability strategy (Tilman and Clark,
2014). This sustainability strategy helps them in connected the organization with the community
in which they are functioning in terms of economy, social and environment context.
Sustainability strategy helps the organization to generate a strong connection with the elements
present in the market in terms of government, society, and community. This report includes the
highlight of literature reviews which are connected with the sustainability acts analyzed by
various scholars. This report is also including the sustainability strategies used by Nike
organization which connected them with the environment protection program. It is also
highlighting the area of work which has been taken into action under the sustainability strategy
of the organization. For exploring this information, secondary data method has been used due
to its wide area coverage.
If there is no planet, there is no sport
As per the study it has been seen that many environmental issues have been increasing due to
activates carried by human in order to prove themselves best from nature. From the many
years, there has been a difference in between importance of environment and conversation of
the environment (Natanzon et al., 2013). It has been seen that in order to fulfill the desire of the
human, organization are ready to sacrifice asset related to environmental protection. Nike
organization has understood the importance of environment protection and has started working
on this platform with the help of their most sustainability strategy. Under this strategy Nike
organization is covering many important aspects which connect the organization with the planet
in terms of reducing carbon footprint in energy, action against waste generation, focus on water
protection and take responsibility to make use of environment-friendly chemicals (Bhattacharjee
et al., 2014).
In carbon and energy section, Nike Company has committed to reducing carbon emission
percentage in their all business operations by reducing the use of chemicals in their business
process in terms of production and supply chain areas. As per the Nike Company, these two
areas are considered as main source of carbon emission in the environment (Nike, 2019).

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Therefore company is continuously working to lower down percentage of carbon footprint with
the help of advanced manufacturing technique in order to bring effectiveness and efficiency in
their business operations (Yu, Wei and Wang, 2014). The company is focusing on making more
use of renewable sources such as wind energy and solar energy so that they can reduce their
dependency on the non-renewable sources which will help the company to bring a reduction in
carbon emission in the environment
In addition to this, company is continuously working on the waste management technique to low
down the amount of waste produced in the company on the global level. In this company has
started recycling products like polyester, Flyleather, and Flyknit in order to use it as a
sustainable strategy to obtain a high level of waste reduction. Right Now Nike Company is
working on zero waste technology with the help of their lean technology in its product plants
(Nike news, 2018). This technology has been implementing in Nike China plant in most of the
steps in the form of automation in their manufacturing plant in which most of the steps are being
controlled by Robertic arms which offer high efficiency with great accuracy in the manufacturing
product. This helps the company in reducing waste in their business process.
(Source: Nike environment protection, 2018)
According to various researches, it has been found that water quantity and quality is being
under continuous threat due to activities of human. This issue has been well recognized by the
Nike Company and is working to reduce water footprint on a yearly base. For this company has
focused on reducing use of water in all their planet across the world with the help of innovative
technology in which they are recycling the used water and then process them to make usage
again from human point of view.

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Nike Company has also understood the rising social issue in the community. In this strategy,
Nike Company has introduced many social programs in order to offer benefits to the community
in which an organization is currently operating. In 2019 Nike company has introduced a future
varsity program under which a leadership training will be offered to the youth of African
American in order to bring positive change in their society with the help of their learning
especially equality (Nike, 2018). Under this program, these students will be mentored completed
as per the present need of the surroundings. In addition to this, Nike Company has also
supported various sports programs like basketball tournaments on the global level to offer
education support to those students which belong to the poor population of the community
(Nike, 2019). Company believes that in order to bring children on right platform, sports play one
of the most important roles by encouraging them towards leadership as well as positivity in the
behaviour.
Nike operates sweatshop of labours
(Source: Marc Bain, 2017)
As per the Workers right consortium, it has been found that Nike Company is supporting
Sweatshops labour in their various plants which are located in most of the developing countries.
Nike Company is blamed by exploiting the workers by depriving them of their basic right. In
addition to this, it has been found that the conditions of the worker are not good which are
working under the influence of sweatshop strategy. In this company is trying to extract more
from these workers by taking advantage of their poverty (Nike, 2018). It has been found that
these workers are made to work for extra hours at high temperature and are not given extra
amount for their efforts. These workers are continuously struggling from poverty and health
under this sweatshop labours (Merk, 2014). In addition to this, it has been found that workers

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are being discriminated on the base of their background, colour and believes. As a result of this
worker are made to continuously work in this environment which is full of discrimination and
abuse. Nike Company is also blamed for not allowing WRC group to inspect the current
condition of worker in their manufacturing factories so that their unethical practice may not get
open on the public forum (Bain, 2017). Many student groups in US launched an ant sweatshop
rally in which they have criticized Nike Company for their negative attitude towards the workers
who are working for the growth and development of the company. The workers are treated as a
profit-making machine in the eyes of factory and are not considered as an asset for the
company.
Recommendation
These rallies have a very negative impact on the brand image of the Nike Company. As a result
of this, the company has to bear heavy loss in the market related to the sale. In order to regain
their brand image, management of the organization must focus on conducting audit related to
this sweatshop's unethical practices going on in their factories regularly in order to explore the
reality of the situation. In addition to this, company must plan some compensation related to the
workers like health benefits, offering them a better working environment and overtime pay in
order to improve their present living standard. This will offer two types of benefit to the company,
one creates a better image in the eyes of the community and others will be connecting worker of
the employee with the objective of the organization. Management this decision will make
workers trust on the company and will offer their best performance to meet the overall purpose
of the company. In addition to this company must make renewable resource as the medium of
energy source and must minimize the non-renewable resource to their maximum lower end if
possible.
Conclusion
Due to high competition in the sports industry, it is not easy for Nike to remain market leader for
a long time because other brands are also fighting in the same market with same target
audience. In this situation, a sustainable strategy will offer one of the most important aspects
which are important for the growth and development of the company. In addition to this,
sustainability strategy will help the company to connect with community in which they are
operating in terms of environmental safety and water protection.This will help Nike company to

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create a unique image in the sports industry which will act as competitive gain over other
companies present in the business market.

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References
Bain, M. (2017) Nike is facing a new wave of anti-sweatshop protests[online]. Available from:
https://qz.com/1042298/nike-is-facing-a-new-wave-of-anti-sweatshop-protests/ [Accessed 21/5/19].
Bhattacharjee, R., Munjal, N., Singh, B. and Singh, P., McAfee LLC. (2014) System and method
for critical address space protection in a hypervisor environment. U.S. Patent 8,694,738.
Liu, J., Mooney, H., Hull, V., Davis, S.J., Gaskell, J., Hertel, T., Lubchenco, J., Seto, K.C.,
Gleick, P., Kremen, C. and Li, S. (2015) Systems integration for global
sustainability. Science, 347(6225), p.1258832.
Merk, J. (2014) The rise of tier 1 firms in the global garment industry: Challenges for labour
rights advocates. Oxford Development Studies, 42(2), pp.259-277.
Natanzon, A., Cohen, S., Vitek, S. and Kulik, A., EMC International Co. (2013) Mirroring
metadata in a continuous data protection environment. U.S. Patent 8,438,135.
Nike news. (2018) Nike's Latest Sustainable Innovations and Environmental Impact [online].
Available from: https://news.nike.com/news/sustainable-innovation-air-bag-manufacture [Accessed
21/5/19].
Nike. (2018) How Nike’s Future Varsity Youth Leaders Are Making a Positive Change in Their
Communities [online]. Available from: https://niachantal.com/how-nikes-future-varsity-youth-
leaders-making-change/ [Accessed 21/5/19].
Nike. (2018) This Could Be the Next Step for the New, Socially Conscious Nike [online].
Available from: https://www.thecut.com/2018/09/nikes-colin-kaepernick-ad-raises-issues-of-
workers-rights.html[Accessed 21/5/19].
Nike. (2019) Nike Celebrates the Kickoff of Its Future Varsity Program in Atlanta [online].
Available from: https://niachantal.com/nike-celebrates-the-kickoff-of-its-future-varsity-program-in-
atlanta/[Accessed 21/5/19].
Nike. (2019) Purpose moves us [online]. Available from: https://purpose.nike.com/
[Accessed 21/5/19].
Tilman, D. and Clark, M. (2014) Global diets link environmental sustainability and human
health. Nature, 515(7528), p.518.
Yu, S., Wei, Y.M. and Wang, K. (2014) Provincial allocation of carbon emission reduction
targets in China: an approach based on improved fuzzy cluster and Shapley value
decomposition. Energy Policy, 66, pp.630-644.