Awb Business Ethics

We look into the unlawful and unethical practices by the Australian Wheat export company AWB Limited, found in the Cole inquiry of the contracts with the Iraq government from 1996 to 2003 through the United Nations (UN) Food-For-Oil Program.

The legislative authority called the Australian Wheat Board held the contract with the Iraq Grain Board (IGB) through the UN Food-For-Oil program until July 1999. As a result the Australian Wheat Board was privatised and became AWB Limited. All contracts through the UN sanctioned program with Iraq were maintained by the company as the sole exporter of wheat in Australia. AWB Ltd then begin their downward path of unethical negotiations by entering into contracts with the IGB and accepting to cover and pay

Although AWB deceived and withheld information from the UN in order to bypass their sanctions, the company acted in the best interest of its shareholders instead of all its stakeholders. Ethically they were wrong and they knew what their actions would eventuate, and where their funding through kickbacks to Iraq was going to.

The culture at AWB was one of a high stakes, where the organisation must win at all cost no matter how. Unfortunately this type of culture and its people was the major contributing factor of the behavioural precedence and choices made in the Iraq’s wheat trade. This culture steamed all the way from the top, beginning with the Managing Director Andrew Lindberg, who we will discuss further on.

The main factors resulting in the unethical behaviour of the AWB people, was the pressure from the shareholders and the board members for a greater return and retention of contracts. Some of those board members were wheat grain growers. Additional pressure from the AWB sales and marketing people, were motivating factors to meet performance targets and goal

The International Sales and Marketing Division would have only been doing what was part of their job, and for most would have been throughout their careers. This thought process or moral behaviour could have been influenced by other factors like Organisational Culture, which changes individual characteristics in order to fit within the organisation.

Studies suggest that honesty and integrity are the two utmost qualities one must have to be a good leader (Denton 2010). As the organisation leader at the time of the AWB scandal, Andrew Lindberg would have contributed and somewhat influenced the culture, pushing the business of AWB over and beyond legal and moral boundaries for the best possible return (Botterill 2007). This was supported later when Lindberg was found guilty of making four breaches of the Corporations Act. Andrew Lindberg had the authority to request further details and do something about the disclosure of payments to the IGB in full detail. However he decided to jump the moral fence and allow concealment of the trucking fees to walk the field of increased