Zara owner and Spain’s largest listed company Inditex is facing pressure from shareholders to publicly disclose the full details of its supply chain.
According to a Reuters report, investors are demanding greater transparency to “help us determine their supply chain resilience”, as London-based investor Artemis Investment Management put it.
Grace Su, portfolio manager at Clearbridge Investments, said “It's very important because of all the scrutiny around ESG, and labour, and inputs”.
“They claim to be a leader in this so it's really important for them to actually have that level of disclosure,” she added.
Unlike European rivals H&M and Primark, the Zara owner does not currently publish information about individual factories and manufacturers.
"Inditex has a deep commitment to maintaining high standards in its supply chain, and believe that our industry-leading traceability system, which gives us maximum visibility of the supply chain, is key to this," Inditex told Reuters.
The development comes as Inditex’s annual earnings call approached on Wednesday, 13 March.
Inditex noted a “very strong operating performance” in the third quarter and forecast that full-year gross margins will improve 75 basis points (0.75%) year on year on the back of store optimisation and a 3% increase in gross space.
Capital expenditure is estimated at €1.6 billion (£1.36 billion).
Inditex shares are currently 3.2% higher year to date.