About Bidvest

Bidvest is a leading business-to-business services, trading and distribution group operating through two broad categories of operations and six operating divisions, namely the business services operations, which comprise the Services, Freight and Financial Services divisions, and the trading and distribution operations, which comprise the Branded Products, Commercial Products and Automotive divisions.

The Group has an entrepreneurial and decentralised operating philosophy that allows businesses and the Group to be nimble and agile, with management teams incentivised and empowered to grow their respective operations within a Group-wide governance framework, as well as well-defined expectations around key performance metrics. The Bidvest corporate office function ensures consistency of strategic direction, culture, monitors operational and financial performance, and allocates and manages capital through well-established and rigorous governance procedures and structures in order to drive performance and ensure an optimised approach to resource allocation across the portfolio of companies and activities.

The Group, which comprises approximately 250 trading companies and employs more than 120,000 people as of 30 June 2021, is a blue-chip company operating primarily in South Africa, Ireland and the United Kingdom. The Group is one of the largest industrial groups in South Africa and a key contributor to the South African economy, providing essential services and products to a wide range of businesses across various sectors.

The Group operates a blended portfolio of defensive, cyclical, and growth assets and has a highly diversified portfolio of businesses, which includes essential and non-cyclical business services and products, and asset light businesses that are cash generative. The investment in core sectors and focus on efficiency has resulted in the growth of Group revenues and profitability that regularly outperforms South Africa's Nominal gross domestic product ("GDP") growth. Innovation is also key, and management focuses on deploying product and services that represent innovative solutions to customer needs and on leveraging technologies to add value to customers and create mutual success. The Group has leading market positions in most of the key markets in which it operates.

Statement of compliance

Bidvest is committed to the highest standards of business integrity, ethics and professionalism. King IV^TM was released on 1 November 2016. King IV^TM advocates an outcome
based-approach and defines corporate governance as the exercise of ethical and effective leadership towards the achievement of the following governance outcomes:

• Ethical culture
• Good performance
• Effective control
• Legitimacy

The practices underpinning the principles in King IV™ are entrenched in many of the Group's internal controls, policies and procedures governing corporate conduct. From a materiality point of view, the board is satisfied that in the main, Bidvest has applied the principles set out in King IV^TM, the detail of which is more fully described in this report.

About this report

This Environmental, Social and Governance Report ("ESG Report") details our environment, social and governance processes and performance for the year 1 July 2020 to 30 June 2021. The scope of this report includes Bidvest Group ("Bidvest" or "the Group" or "the Company") and our operating subsidiaries. The report forms part of the Bidvest annual report suite and is published in October 2021.

Our reporting process has been guided by the principles and requirements contained in the International Financial Reporting Standards ("IFRS"), the IIRC's International Framework, the Global Reporting Index Sustainability Reporting Standards ("GRI"), King IVTM, the JSE Listings Requirements ("Listings Requirements"), the requirements of the remit assigned to social and ethics committees in terms of the South African Companies Act of 2008, as amended (the Companies Act), United Nation's 17 Sustainability Development Goals ("SDGs"), recommendations from the Task Force on Climaterelated Financial Disclosures ("TCFD") and the principals of stakeholder capitalism as championed by the World Economic Forum.

Various policies, standards and charters are reviewed periodically and are available on the Bidvest website. Supplementary sustainability information is also available on the Bidvest website.

The information and data included in this pack have not been externally assured with the exception of the financial information. The key sustainability indicators were robustly reported through the management structure in place within the Bidvest business environment.

Approval of this ESG Report

The board has applied its collective mind to the preparation and presentation of the information in this report. The board believes that this report addressed all material issues and presents a balanced and fair account of the Group's sustainability performance.

22 October 2021