Legal

Aspects of
Internationa
l Business
and
Enterprise
2018
UNILEVER

NAME
Q1:

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE UNILEVER:

Unilever is the multinational company that is involved in the production of consumer goods. In
Australia the company is involved in the production of the health care and personal, food and ice
cream. The rivals of the company in which it operates are Nestle and Procter and Gamble that are
also involved in the production of the consumer goods in the same industry. The company itself
mentioned in its website that about 2.5 billion people around the world use Unilever product
daily. For this reason, Unilever is considered as the number one of the largest multination
company around the world. There are about 1,600 employees working in the Australia and the
numbers of the employee working globally are 165,000. The company headquarter in Australia
is operating in the Sydney while headquarter of the Unilever globally operating in the London
and Rotterdam.

Q2:

Legislative and regulatory framework that is affecting Unilever in Australia:

Any company that is operated in the Australian territory has to follow the Australian regulatory
framework that is set by the Australian Stock Exchange. There are many other regulatory
frameworks that are imposed by the government and these should be complied to avoid any kind
of penalty. The legislative and the regulatory framework are those in which are required to adopt
by the company while operating in any Country. In Australia there are number of legislative and
regulatory framework that are required by the company. These include health and safety
measurement as company is involved in the production of health care and personal care products
so the health and safety measurement should be taken so high. On the other hand, the company
should have high responsibility of the environmental safety such as company in its reports
mentioned that about 2.5 billion products are used all over the world so the packing material
should be dealt correctly and disposed off or recycled it is the responsibility of the Unilever.
Also, there are many other legislative frameworks that are as follows:

Health and safety measurement:

The company first objective is to maintain the health and safety measure in the company site and
maintain the health and safety outside. The company should provide better health and safety
working condition to its employee and provide all necessary tools to them. The company should
provide staff with standard health and safety condition that is required by the legislation so that it
can increase the company reputation all over the world. It also required producing the health and
safety products that are not harming the consumer as they are producing health care product.
These products should meet the health and safety measures.
Environmentally friendly:

In the past the Government of the Australia is promoting the businesses that are producing
environmentally friendly products. Such as the products that are not harming the nature such as
the packaging of the material, the recycling process and it includes the decomposing of the
material. Unilever Australia in involved in the production and recycling process according to the
standard as all over the world about 2.5 billion products re sold so it is company policy to recycle
and decompose packaging material to save the environment. It is said that about 229 million $
has been spent on the company environmental safety project in a year.

During the interview CEO of the Unilever says government not itself a solution, it is a problem
that are imposing many legislative and regulatory framework. climate change is one of the
biggest challenges for almost every country and they are dealing with it by adopting the
condition set by government and in this environmental or in the protection of the climate
Unilever spent about 229 million $ over the year.

The competition and the consumer Act 2010:

According to this act the commission control any kind of misconduct from the company such as
not providing the dangerous goods to the customer or any kind of action that harm the others
products. The need of this commission or act is that in the presence of such huge company the
business of the many local industry ceased production due to low price. To stop this initiative
commission is formed that allow all companies to set their price fairly so that it could not harm
other product that are produced locally.

Privacy law:

It is duty of the company to protect the individual privacy and not to disclose any personal data
outside the company. This is under the Office of Australian information Commissioner (OAIC)
to assure this privacy law and make sure all other companies are dealing with this correctly. This
deal with the company privacy law that the protection of the employee or individual health and
medical record. This also involves the protection of the personal information of the employee
that is obtained in the form of employment. This law assures that the data is safe and the
company is protecting its employee and the consumer privacy. On breach of such law there may
be heavy penalties imposed on the company.

There are many other legislative and regulatory frameworks that are only applied in the
Australian territory such as the disclosure notes in the company annual report and the corporation
tax that is different in every country. The main purpose of this legislation and regulatory
framework is that the government make sure that company is making fair business in the
territory of the Australia, it also make sure that company is complying with all regulatory
framework. The main regulatory frameworks that are imposed by the Government of Australia
on companies are Health and safety measure, the consumer safety, the privacy policy of the
employees and the environmental protection policy. The government and other regulatory
authorities make sure that the company is in compliance with these entire frameworks. The
reason of such kind of legislative and regulatory framework is that government of Australia has
taken steps to save the environment and due to this they are promoting the environmental
friendly products. They know the value of the consumer so their health and safety matters a lot
and the employee working condition should also according to the standard. The other condition
that should be followed is principle of the competition so that it could be fair competition
between the company and local companies.

Q3:

Identification of any treaties that impact on the product and service provided by the
Unilever:

Unilever is the multinational company and operating in many other countries in each country the
product should be sold according to the market condition and agreement with the government
and regulatory authority. There are many products that are under the agreement with government
and regulatory authorities. Company should maintain their product price according to the
competitive and the local product so that offering low price may lead to many local businesses to
cease their business. The other main agreement which is affecting the government is cutting the
wages of the employees of the street ice cream employees, which is under consideration still.
These two agreements are as follows:

The fair price policy:

The fair policy of price is set after many local businesses cease their business after the
introduction of multinational company in Australia. So, after the introduction of such policy each
company has to maintain the price equal as compare to the local product. Recently the company
is involved in the controlled price agreements.

In this agreement the company may charge high price which are offered by the local government.
This effect the product selling price in many ways such as consumer may ask the price in other
countries is comparatively low, as compare to the Australia. This is common that if the
production is high the other cost is low and the price should be set low where in the case of the
local business that produce low quantity of the product so the price and the cost is relatively
high. So due to this reason the local company product is not accepted by the consumer as it was
high and due to this many of the local business was forced to cease their business. One of the
cases is between the Colgate and Cartel proceeding in which due to low price offered from
Colgate resulting penalty of 18 million $ in breach of the Competition and consumer Act 2010.
This is the third highest penalty which is given on the breach of this Act.
The street ice cream Factory and the Unilever:

The street ice cream is not able to meet their expense as they are facing high amount of cost that
includes the transportation cost of freezing transportation. This is the reason many of the street
ice cream worker were facing low wages due to this. But as compare to the many multinational
companies such as Unilever didn’t do this the reason is that they are providing highly famous
such as the Magnum, Paddle Pop and Golden Gaytime. The company are cutting the wages of
the street worker and due to this the union of the street Worker is under strike. to avoid such
scenario the commission of the fair work tried to settle dispute between the company owner and
the street worker so that their condition should be meet. After this agreement company has to
provide their street worker standard wages that are required and the best working conditions.

The agreement of renewing all factories till 2030:

The Unilever is involved in the agreement of renewing all factories till 2020, for this initiative
the company is involved in the purchase agreement of solar and purchase of wind power system,
so that it would transfer all the companies to generate environment friendly energy. The
company generally have plan of 100 % changing the energy source from coal production to
environmental energy production. This initiative is highly promoted by the government of
Australia and their project is highly appreciated by the government of Australia.

Unilever is also committed in the agreement of recycling process:

In this initiative the company is moving towards the introduction of the new process of the
recycling. In this process the 25 % of the plastic is recycled in Australia and it is approximately
750 tones of the plastic will be recycled in Australia.

There are many other agreement and covenants in which the company is committing with its
government and with the regulatory bodies in Australia. Some of the covenants are voluntarily
and some of the agreement are imposed by the government such as the agreement of the wages
and fair price policy of the product. On the breach of such kind of agreement and covenants
cause heavy penalties. While the breach of the agreement of renewing the factories, energy is
voluntarily and if not completed that will not impose any kind of penalty from the government
and from regulatory bodies.

References
About Unilver Australia. (2018). Retrieved from Unilever Australia:
https://www.unilever.com.au/about/who-we-are/introduction-to-unilever/

Australian business and environment laws. (2018). Retrieved from The Australian Government:
https://www.austrade.gov.au/International/Invest/Guide-to-investing/Running-a-
 business/Understanding-Australian-business-regulation/Australian-business-and-environment-
laws

HANNAN, E. (2017). Streets ice cream move to cut wages is industrial blackmail: ACTU. Retrieved
from The Australian: https://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/industrial-
relations/streets-ice-cream-move-to-cut-wages-is-industrial-blackmail-actu/news-
story/e79e0b8a7115bcddf86e142e893ed8e1

Hatch, P. (2018). Tipping point': Unilever to run Australian plants on 100% green power. Retrieved from
The Sydney Morning: https://www.smh.com.au/business/companies/tipping-point-unilever-to-
run-australian-plants-on-100-percent-green-power-20180606-p4zjvd.html

Patty, A. (2017). Streets factory workers offer to save the company millions of dollars. Retrieved from
The Sydney Morning: https://www.smh.com.au/business/workplace/streets-factory-workers-
offer-to-save-the-company-millions-of-dollars-20171106-gzfta1.html

Total number of Unilever employees worldwide from 2003 to 2017. (2018). Retrieved from The Statistic
Portal: https://www.statista.com/statistics/254366/total-number-of-unilever-employees-
worldwide/

Unilever Australia. (2018). Retrieved from Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unilever_Australasia

Unilever calls on union to work constructively to secure Streets factory future. (2017). Retrieved from
https://www.unilever.com.au/news/press-releases/2017/Unilever-calls-on-union-to-work-
constructively-to-secure-Streets-factory-future.html

Vorrath, S. (2018). Unilever to run all Australian factories on 100% renewables by 2020. Retrieved from
One step of the Grid: https://onestepoffthegrid.com.au/unilever-run-australian-factories-100-
renewables-2020/