Today dairy farmers across Australia are struggling due to the ‘Milk Wars’ between Coles and Woolworths, only stocking their own branded products in order to make larger profits and reduce their prices to increase their consumer range. If you do not see this as a problem, you must open your eyes. In June 2014, it was recorded that West Farmers Limited own 33.5 percent and Woolworths Ltd own 39.6 percent the Market Share in Australia. This combined is 73 percent in the total market share. If you do not see this as a problem, you must open your eyes. Have you noticed the rapid decrease from when you were a child to having a local family owned grocery store rather than large monopolies dominating the industry. If you do not see this as a problem, …show more content…
At the moment the Price slashes by Woolworths are devastating for local farmers like dairy farmer Kathleen Johnston forced to send her cows to the abattoirs as she looses money when producing the milk. In an interview she stated that “…spent the night crying about it, because just the thought of selling your babies.” and was unable to finish her sentence as she was reduced to tears over the thought of her prized dairy cows. This is the case for many farmers across Australia who are struggling to make ends meat and are forced to abandon their jobs that they …show more content…
We also see the introduction of the ‘RSPCA’ approved produce, with Woolworths stating that they will only have ‘RSPCA’ approved meet, chicken and eggs on their shelves by 2018. This could destroy some farmers as again they are required to have an extremely high expenditure to meet these requirements and have no choice unless they want to lose business with the large duopolies. The Victorian Farmers Federation and the Australian Farm Institute claim that the new demands imposed by the giants result in the reduction of fertility in Australian agriculture and increase and impose new cost of production to Australian
RNRA Team, “Supermarkets, Fresh Produce and New Commodity Chains: What Future for the Small Producer?” Hot Topics: February, 2004.
What’s the difference between a Walmart and a farmers’ market? What causes these differences? And, what are we more partial to? Tracie McMillan delves into the intricacies and complications of our nation’s food industry in The American Way of Eating. Specifically, as McMillan integrates herself into the farming and grocer/selling aspect of the industry, it is evident the food system has been extremely successful in offering ‘abundance, accessibility, and affordability’ to its consumers.
American consumers think of voting as something to be done in a booth when election season comes around. In fact, voting happens with every swipe of a credit card in a supermarket, and with every drive-through window order. Every bite taken in the United States has repercussions that are socially, politically, economically, and morally based. How food is produced and where it comes from is so much more complicated than the picture of the pastured cow on the packaging seen when placing a vote. So what happens when parents are forced to make a vote for their children each and every meal? This is the dilemma that Jonathan Safran Foer is faced with, and what prompted his novel, Eating Animals. Perhaps one of the core issues explored is the American factory farm. Although it is said that factory farms are the best way to produce a large amount of food at an affordable price, I agree with Foer that government subsidized factory farms use taxpayer dollars to exploit animals to feed citizens meat produced in a way that is unsustainable, unhealthy, immoral, and wasteful. Foer also argues for vegetarianism and decreased meat consumption overall, however based on the facts it seems more logical to take baby steps such as encouraging people to buy locally grown or at least family farmed meat, rather than from the big dogs. This will encourage the government to reevaluate the way meat is produced. People eat animals, but they should do so responsibly for their own benefit.
Breeding sows are confined in gestation stalls, pigs have their tails cut off without anesthesia, calves are tethered by their necks in veal crates, and egg-laying hens are debeaked and kept in cages too small to spread their wings in; in a factory farm, animals are treated as commodities. This vivid imagery depicts the facts pertaining to animals. The search for solutions has focused on two paths; one reforming the system and instituting more humane standards, and the second promoting veganism so that fewer animals are bred, nurtured, and slaughtered. While few animal activists disagree with promoting veganism, some believe that campaigning for reforms, and humane labeling is counter-productive. Humane standards can either be required by law, or instituted voluntarily by farmers. Farmers who voluntarily agree to higher humane standards are either opposed to factory farming, or are trying to appeal to consumers who prefer meat from humanely raised and slaughtered animals. There is no single definition of “humane meat,” and many animal activists would say that the term is an oxymoron. Different meat producers and organizations have their own humane standards by which they abide. Humane standards might include larger cages, no cages, natural feed, less painful methods of slaughter, or prohibition of practices such as tail docking or debeaking. In some cases, campaigns target retailers or restaurants instead of the actual producers, and pressure the companies to purchase animal products only from producers who raise the animals according to certain voluntary standards. Societies individuality is split by advocates and opponents; is there a fine line between truth and falsehood, or is animal slaughter for diet always inhumane?
“We take care of animals, and the animals take care of us.” (Rollin 212). The preceding phrase is a policy that American farmers in the old west lived their lives by. Modern farmers live do not live their lives anywhere near to this phrase because they own factory farms, and the whole reason for having a factory farm is to fit as many animals in a small space as possible in order to maximize profit. Factory Farms, or Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFO) first appeared in the 1920s, right after Vitamins A and D, because if animals are given these vitamins in their diets, exercise and sunlight are not necessities for the animals to grow anymore (In Defense of Animals 1). The growing number of factory farms is coupled with the decreasing population of rural areas, which means that many people are beginning to factory farm because it yields a higher profit (“Agricultural Sciences” 170). In the 1950s, the average number of chickens on a given egg farm in the United States was 100, but now the average number is a shocking 10,000 chickens (“Factory Farms” 4). The reason for the increase of chickens has to do with new and cheaper technology developed just after World War II. The new technology increased the number of chickens, while it had the opposite effect on dairy and meat cows, their numbers went in the other direction. The number of cows used for milk was cut by more than half between 1950 and 2000, because farmers discovered new and more efficient methods for milking cows (Weeks 4). Many activists for animals’ rights are concerned about the methods used by factory farmers because they confine their animals into tight spaces and since there are so many of them in a small ...
Business strategy is the means by which firm’s plans to achieve its goals and objectives. It can also be termed as organization long-term planning. The strategy covers periods between 3-5 years and sometimes longer. Businesses use two major types of strategy, general or generic and competitive strategies. The overall strategy involves strategies of growth, globalization and retrenchment. The competitive advantage includes low pricing, product and customer differentiation. We will look at the business strategy used by Marks and Spenser (Cole, 1997). The company is a British multinational located at Westminster London and specializes in clothes and luxurious food products.
Current public concern is the result of a wide-ranging, well-financed propaganda campaign of negatives – negatives intended to strike fear in the hearts of countless consumers "over there" and now, over here. Government agricultural agencies of var...
Marks & Spencer is one of the UK's foremost retailers of clothing, foods, homeware and financial services, boasting a weekly customer base of 10 million in over 300 UK stores. Marks & Spencer operate in 30 countries worldwide, and has a group turnover in excess of £8 billion. It has specific values, missions and visions. It’s main vision is ‘to be the standard against which all others are measured’, it’s main mission is ‘to make aspirational quality accessible to all’, and it’s main values are quality, service, innovation and trust. (www.marksandspencer.co.uk).
...struggling to earn any income at all and sometimes do not even get the opportunity to eat. Another issue that Raj Patel did not touch on is the lack of care consumers have for the farmers. It seems that consumers care about farmers about as much as the corporations do, which, in my opinion, is not a lot. When consumers only care about low prices and large corporations only care about making a profit, the farmers are left out to dry. Many consumers believe “food should be available at a bargain price, a belief that relies on labor exploitation and environmental exhaustion at multiple points along the commodity chain.” (Wright, 95) Corporations as well as consumers generally tend to be selfish and I think Raj Patel is afraid to mention this. If only these people cared a little bit more about each other I believe the hourglass of the food system will begin to even out.
Animals are violently tortured, trapped, caged, hurt, poisoned, blind, and killed and no one gives any care about the concern. According to the Last Chance for Animals Organization, “Farmed animals are bred, fed, confined, and drugged to lay more eggs, birth more offspring, and die with more meat on their bones at the expense of their health, wellbeing and social development.” They are pumped with antibiotics for rapid growth, maintaining health, and preventing and treating diseases. In the book called, “Vegetarianism” by Justin Healey, he states, “The number of animal species in Australia is declining at a higher rate than any other country except the USA” (Healey 9). Many animals are facing their deaths for the production of meat to rise. Animal agriculture businesses consider animals more as production than living species. There are characteristics of animals that people do not notice, like how pigs are affection or chickens are smart like
Supply chain management is basically refers to the fundamental supply chain analysis of the organization which predominantly describes functionalities from source to the delivery point. In this process of delivery, supply chain management framework divides in four categories: In Planning the products and suppliers evaluated and selected, Sourcing pull the information process including contracting, ordering and expediting, Moving is a physical process from suppliers to end user and Paying is the financial process including payment and performance measurement.
Dunnes Stores is an indigenous, family owned Irish Company. The Company is a retailer in both the food and textile market who work around the principle of providing competitive prices, high quality products and a vast variety of choices. The company’s motto of “Better Value” looks to draw in all these principles together.
In the case, Marks & Spencer and Zara, it discusses two business process designs that each company took. You first had Marks & Spencer, who had a more traditional approach. Their chain started of with the buying team, design, developers, merchandisers, technologist, suppliers, logistics, and lastly the store. Zara, however, comes up with a new innovative design. With this new design in effect the delivery of new collections only has a lead-time of 5 days. They were able to cut down this time due to the fact that products where mainly produced on Galicia.
Performance management is a management tool used to value, monitor and measure a company’s strategies that ensure the efficiency and effectiveness of its product delivery. This management tool does not focus on the organisation and on its employees as well as stakeholders. It is a continuous process that entails that managers make sure that organisational and employee values are corresponding (Aguinis, 2005,p.1/2-1/5). Performance Management brings about the competencies in the employees, increases self-esteem by giving feedback to employees, there is a low number of lawsuits because it helps understand the company better (eThekwini Municipality, 2008,p.10-11). According to Pride, Hughes and Kapoor (2011, p.288) performance management creates motivation for employees; one theory of motivation is of Expectancy, which stipulates that employees satisfaction is driven by expectations of what an organisation will offer in return.
The food and staples retailing is an increasingly competitive industry. The market giants (competitors) are Coles (owned by Wesfarmers) which has 741 stores across Australia and plans to add 70 m...