No sooner had Gordon Brown unpacked his bags at Downing Street than Oxfam were calling on the new Prime Minister to take action to encourage greater ethical sourcing in the public sector.

Just weeks later a Guardian investigation raised some uncomfortable questions surrounding the sourcing practices employed by some of the UK’s most prominent retailers and now a new report has claimed that ethical sourcing could see production costs rise by as much as 5% in the near future.

The report ‘The Future of Ethical Sourcing’ , which was carried out by Verdict Research, found that as many as 40% of respondents thought that increased ethical sourcing would see production costs rise by between 5 and 10%, with a further 35.7% saying that they expected a rise of up to 5%.

Less than 10% thought there would be no increase in costs, and 14.3% of respondents said they believed that production costs would soar by over 10%.

The report – which identified that sourcing concerns were increasingly concentrating on environmental as well as Labour issues - also claimed that ethical sourcing expense was likely to place retailers under huge pressure.

"With margins already under increasing pressure from escalating rents and fixed costs, finding a way to absorb the ethical sourcing expense will prove crucial to the profitability and survival of many retail businesses," the report said.

Whether profits will be sacrificed in the quest to source ethically remains to be seen, but there’s little doubt that the pressure placed on companies by increasingly ethical aware consumers, will take its toll on those who chose to ignore these concerns.