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Primark has a long-term commitment to promote decent work in its supply chain.
A trainee operator in the Sudokkho programme at a Primark supplier factory in Dhaka, Bangladesh
Primark's Supply Chain Human Rights Policy outlines its commitment to human rights due diligence in its supply chain, the foundation of which is built on its Supplier Code of Conduct which sets out the standards the business expects of its suppliers.
The Primark Supplier Code of Conduct, which is based on the Core Conventions and the Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work of the International Labour Organization, covers Primark’s supply chain, including goods for sale and services such as service providers, logistics and transportation. It includes supplier requirements on labour rights such as health and safety, freedom of association, discrimination and child and forced labour. It also covers suppliers and providers of those goods and services Primark does not sell, but which it consumes itself or requires in the running of its operations. Compliance with the Supplier Code of Conduct is a key condition of doing business with Primark.
Primark takes a risk-based, worker-centric approach to human rights due diligence that makes use of multiple channels of information to set priorities and manage risk within its supply chain. This includes desk-based research, audits, direct engagement with workers and their representatives, as well as engagement in local and international forums.
Primark greatly values engagement with a global network of local and international stakeholders, unions, governments and civil society organisations whose support and feedback are essential to its progress.
Primark’s ETES team has over 130 people based predominantly in its 10 key sourcing markets. The work of the team ranges from risk assessment to supporting suppliers and their factories in implementing its Supplier Code of Conduct.
Primark’s social audit and monitoring programme is one of the key elements of how human rights due diligence is implemented in its product supply chain. Through this programme, Primark conducted over 2,400 social audits during the calendar year 2024. These audits are carried out by Primark employees based in sourcing countries, and also by carefully selected third parties. Primark carries the full cost of these audits, which include rigorous checks for human rights issues based on first-hand assessment of the working environment, reviews of relevant documentation and confidential worker interviews. At the end of each audit, supplier factories are issued with a time-bound corrective action plan that outlines any areas for improvement. Primark uses these audits in the approval process for all new tier one factories1. Any potential new factories are audited and only if the outcome of the audit is satisfactory can any orders be placed.
Primark also implements additional due diligence activities where necessary. For example, its Structural Integrity Programme was established in 2013 in Bangladesh to assess the safety of all supplier factory buildings against international standards. If areas are found to require improvement, it works with the suppliers and their factories, in collaboration with a team of structural and civil engineers from international engineering firms, to provide technical support and guidance. The Structural Integrity Programme was expanded to Pakistan and Cambodia in 2023, with ad hoc support for other sourcing countries as required.
Primark believes it is important that organisations, workers and their representatives can raise grievances and alert the business to potential breaches of standards. The business is committed to making grievance mechanisms available to its colleagues and people in its supply chain. This includes:
Primark also receives grievances through other channels, including the customer services section of its website, confidential worker interviews during social audits and workers having direct contact with Primark colleagues and its partner organisations. When issues or grievances are raised, Primark investigates thoroughly while protecting the confidentiality of those raising the complaint, and anyone else who might be affected. Primark does not tolerate any retaliation against those who have raised a grievance and any affected stakeholders.
More detail about Primark’s approach to human rights due diligence can be found in its Modern Slavery Statement, Supply Chain Human Rights Policy and Sustainability and Ethics Report.
1.Factories manufacturing finished goods.
Where inherent risks and more systemic issues are identified, Primark’s Social Impact team works with suppliers and their factories, as well with partners and other brands, to support suppliers to address these through longer-term solutions and projects. The first of these projects began well over a decade ago, and the portfolio of work continues to grow and develop. Local teams play a key role in working closely with the supply chain and external experts to identify issues, find solutions and share learnings with others. Over the years, Primark has identified several thematic areas to support factory workers in its supply chain, some of which are included in the Primark Cares strategy and are aligned with the activities undertaken as part of Primark’s supply chain human rights due diligence. These include:
Primark continues to address the specific challenges faced by vulnerable workers in its supply chain, including migrant workers, particularly in India, which is a key sourcing country. Since 2017, Primark’s My Life programme has supported these workers by equipping them with essential life skills, including communication, knowledge of workplace rights and health practices, with a strong focus on women. Developed in partnership with NGOs Women Win and Maitrayana, the programme has been adapted over time to meet local needs, including language and cultural barriers.
Alongside this, Primark has expanded its efforts to strengthen the financial resilience of workers through several initiatives focused on social protection and financial inclusion. In 2025, these initiatives are run in three countries and provide a wide range of support, from supporting factories to transition to digital wage payments in Cambodia, to essential life skills training for workers in India and supporting access to social insurance in China. These initiatives aim to build long-term stability and reduce vulnerability across the supply chain.
Primark’s work in this area continues to be focused on industry collaboration through its membership of ACT (Action, Collaboration, Transformation), working on transparency on wage data and continued embedding of ACT’s purchasing practices. Primark’s social audit programme also monitors supplier factories’ compliance with legal wage requirements.
Every two years, ACT conducts a survey on purchasing practices with suppliers and employees of its member brands. In February and March 2025, an updated version of the survey was completed by Primark’s colleagues and suppliers. The full set of results for the 2021 and 2023 surveys have been published by Primark on its Sustainability and Ethics Progress Report. The aggregate results for the 2025 survey, for all ACT brands, are expected to be published at the end of 2025.
Primark recognises that embedding responsible purchasing practices2 will support better conditions to enable suppliers and their factories to pursue a living wage.
The business set up a working group, comprising some of its key suppliers and its own
in-country teams, to develop a tool to identify labour costs. To date, Primark has also provided training to 350 suppliers and 550 buying and merchandising colleagues on this costing method. Following training on the ACT Labour Costing Protocol, 98% of final orders placed with Cambodian factories for Primark Spring/Summer 2025 season provided the labour cost of products. Primark continues to train and upskill its product teams on the importance of implementing responsible purchasing practices. Further details on Primark’s work in this area can be found in its Sustainability and Ethics Progress Report.
2.Read more about the purchasing practices commitments of ACT members here.
Primark’s Global Sourcing Map3 covers tier one factories that make its products, and the number and gender of workers at each site. Since 2022, Primark has been rolling out its Traceability programme. Primark is using the platform TrusTrace to map its products. In 2025, the programme reached 230 suppliers and 10 raw materials. This includes Primark’s clothing, textile and footwear suppliers, meaning it now has a dashboard of these supply chains, from raw material to finished product. Primark trains suppliers on data requirements within this programme and how they can support it.
3.The factories featured on the map are Primark's suppliers' production sites which represent approximately 98% of Primark products for sale in its stores. A factory is detailed on the Map only after it has produced products for Primark for a year and has become an established supplier. Tier one factories manufacture finished goods.
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Primark’s Sudokkho programme in Bangladesh was developed to enhance in-house technical training capabilities within supplier factories. The programme continues to expand its reach, with new factories joining and existing ones increasing their involvement. As of 2025, Sudokkho covers 28 factories across Bangladesh.
The technical training that Sudokkho delivers has several layers. The foundational level trains factory workers through a dedicated initiative in the factory, where trainees acquire new required skills. The initiative develops and trains assessors who support overseeing the technical standards of trainees on the training line before they enter the main production line. Finally, the technical training includes training existing skilled operators, with a specific focus on women, to be supervisors. Its delivery partner, Rajesh Bheda Consulting has been collecting data to evaluate the extent to which factories can maintain Sudokkho training without ongoing support and to measure the programme’s long-term effectiveness. This includes evaluating factors such as the presence of a dedicated training line, skilled supervisors and trainers who can train others.
In 2025, Primark’s team in Bangladesh surveyed workers and management from 20 factories involved in the programme.
Factory workers undergoing training as part of the Sudokkho programme, Bangladesh
Gender-based violence and harassment (GBVH) is an extremely sensitive issue globally, primarily faced by women. This is often a difficult issue to identify in factories in the garment supply chain, but the risk is real, particularly in South Asia. This is a priority for Primark as it recognises that it is also a barrier to women’s progression.
In India, Primark has partnered with St John’s Medical College in Bangalore to develop and deliver workplace wellbeing programmes. Building on the success of its mental health initiative, My Space, Primark and St John’s created a new programme called Maitri to address GBVH in the workplace through peer-based interventions.
Maitri has been implemented in nine factories and is already helping Primark identify and better understand GBVH risks in the supply chain. The programme trains selected workers to become Gender Champions, trusted peers who listen to colleagues and act as a source of support when GBVH concerns arise.
It is still too early to measure the full impact of Maitri, but initial outcomes suggest the model is effective in surfacing sensitive GBVH issues that might otherwise go undetected. This is helping Primark explore more informed ways to respond and support resolution.
Maitri also complements Primark’s existing grievance mechanisms by offering a more informal, peer-led channel for workers to raise concerns.
Attendees at an event organised as part of the Maitri programme, India
Across Primark’s sourcing regions, most workers are entitled to state benefits, including social protection, and often it is mandatory for factory workers and employers to contribute to employee pension funds. Primark is investing in a number of financial literacy programmes to help workers in its supply chain access the knowledge and tools they need to take control of their finances, from understanding payslips to registering for social insurance. In 2025, these initiatives now run in factories across four countries and cover a wide range of support.
In India, workers in the garment supply chain often have difficulty in accessing their pension funds, held in the state-run Employee Provident Fund (EPF), because of complexities in the system. There are also a number of state-run social protection schemes that workers in India are eligible to access, adding further to the complexity.
To help tackle this, Primark has developed a programme called Securing Futures, which trains select workers to become Nanbans whose role it is to help workers register their details on a government portal in order to access the EPF. Primark has rolled out this initiative in India with the aim of demonstrating to workers the benefits of and requirements for accessing the EPF.
Primark has also invested in a partnership and programme with Haqdarshak. Now running across seven factories, the Haqdarshak programme supports workers to access a broader suite of government welfare through better access to technology.
Primark is working with Haqdarshak to understand the impact of the pilot to date, including the value of potential state benefits workers could access, in addition to collecting worker feedback on the programme.
Primark is currently supporting similar programmes in China.
Garment workers in Primark’s supply chain who have participated in the Securing Futures programme, India
Primark continues to support programmes to improve mental health awareness in its supplier factories. Research by Primark and its partners identified depression and anxiety among factory workers and that access to mental health services is generally poor.
In Bangladesh, in partnership with the British Asian Trust, the Moner Kotha (‘mind talk’ in Bengali) programme aims to increase awareness of mental health issues and build resilience among workers. This is done by providing support for workers through training, capacity building and the provision of mental health information in the workplace.
Taking learnings from a British Asian Trust review and a programme evaluation, Primark designed the next phase to have more of an emphasis on showing factory management the importance and impact of good mental health, encouraging them to support access to counselling among teams.
Primark’s My Space programme in India has become a leading example of how workplaces can change attitudes and behaviours around mental health. Similar to Moner Kotha, the programme trains selected factory staff to become lay counsellors who support colleagues experiencing poor mental health or stress. In the long term, improved dialogue and understanding of mental health can reduce the stigma. Primark runs the programme in partnership with St John’s Medical College, India. In 2025, the programme has started segregating workplace and personal issues, so that steps can be taken to alleviate those related to work. My Space has also added art therapy and physical health discussions to its curriculum and strengthened engagement with migrant workers through tailored training to overcome language barriers.
To further this agenda, Primark established the Workplace Mental Health Network in 2023, inviting other international apparel brands to build a network of experience in enhancing the availability of mental health support for workers in supply chains. The aim is to encourage knowledge sharing and to build a platform of resources for those involved. As of 2025, there are nine global brands participating in the programme.
Garment workers in Primark’s supply chain who have participated in the Securing Futures programme in India
Vision is essential for garment workers performing detailed tasks like sewing, fabric cutting and operating machinery. Poor vision impacts productivity, increases the possibility of faulty production and accident risk, and can lead to absenteeism, reduced earnings and mental health issues.
Primark’s Clear Vision workplace programme, in partnership with Vision Spring, provides vision tests and glasses to the factory workforce, aiming to increase earning potential, learning ability, safety, and wellbeing in Bangladesh.
Common causes of vision loss include uncorrected refractive errors, cataracts and glaucoma, with 80% of cases being preventable or treatable. Barriers to treatment include limited rural access, infrastructure gaps and financial constraints. Suppliers share a proportion of the total cost for the project implementation, demonstrating a strong recognition of the need for glasses as well as their benefits to workers and factories.
Primark has partnered with Clear Vision to deliver a programme which aims to support workers through the provision of glasses, helping them experience the benefits of clear vision and improved quality of life.
In 2025, nearly 35,000 eye tests were carried out, with glasses provided to 12,982 workers. 90% of these were first-time wearers. Following the project’s success across the initial 16 factories, Primark will continue to expand the project into more factories in Bangladesh.
Factory worker participant from the Clear Vision workplace programme, Bangladesh
