Stakeholders and their objectives

Read the information below and then answer the questions that follow.

Simply Bake plc

Palm oil is a cheap oil ingredient used in the manufacture of many everyday items. Production of palm oil often involves farmers clearing rainforests. The destruction of this habitat has led to the loss of many animal species, including half of the world’s orangutans.

Powerful campaign groups with many members, such as Greenpeace and the World Wildlife Foundation, have highlighted the issue. As a result, consumers are increasingly aware of the environmental impact of using palm oil.

Simply Bake plc is a supplier of cakes to supermarkets, who then retail them as their ‘own brand’ products. For many years, palm oil has been an important ingredient in Simply Bake plc’s products, allowing it to meet the demand for cheap food.

In 2018, a small campaign group, Action against Palm Oil (APO), criticised Simply Bake plc. APO had carried out a survey using a sample of 100 of its 400 members to represent the views of UK consumers. The survey found that 67% of respondents wanted the government to ban the use of palm oil.

High-profile media campaigns have increasingly drawn attention to the issue of palm oil production. By 2019, supermarkets had noticed increasing numbers of enquiries from their customers about palm oil and environmental damage.

Finding alternative ingredients is difficult and expensive, but in 2020 Simply Bake plc announced that it will have changed all its recipes to remove palm oil by 2025.

Explain why APO’s survey findings may not represent the views of UK consumers.

Explain how stakeholder mapping would help Simply Bake plc decide how it responds to criticism from APO.

Simply Bake plc decided to remove palm oil from its products.

With reference to Lewin’s force field analysis, analyse why this decision was made.

‘Businesses will never act in a socially responsible way unless they are forced to do so by governments.’

To what extent is this true for all businesses?

The managers of a business propose to retain all of its profit to finance automation of its production. This is most likely to cause conflict with:

To what extent would the reactions of SSN Ltd’s stakeholders to the possible takeover be likely to lead to conflict between those stakeholders?

‘Limited liability benefits all stakeholders of a public limited company.’

Do you agree? Justify your view.

OR

Analyse the benefits to stakeholders of the rise in the share price of Sunport PLC.