Nestlé to
be exposed by international gathering of human rights campaigners Announcement: 16 October and 23
October events Nestlé, the world’s largest food company, is to be
exposed for malpractice including aggressive marketing of baby
foods, trade union busting, environmental destruction and exploitation
of suppliers as international experts meet at the European
Social Forum, London, 16 October 16:30 - 18:30 and at a public meeting
in Edinburgh, 23 October, 13:00 - 17:30. The International Baby
Food Action Network (IBFAN), celebrating 25 years of campaigning
to protect infants and their families, will present monitoring
results gathered in 69 countries, which show Nestlé continues
to be the worst of the baby food companies in pushing artificial
feeding over breastfeeding. While Nestlé is the target of
a 20-country boycott for this malpractice, there are other concerns
about its activities, which experts will expose. The London event
is being chaired by Dr. Caroline Lucas MEP, representing the International
Forum on Globalisation. The Brazilian Citizens’ Movement for Water will explain its
involvement in winning a legal action against Nestlé over
the environmental destruction caused by Nestlé Perrier's
water bottling operation in the historic spa town of São
Lourenço. Despite promising the judge and a hearing in the
House of Representatives that it would close down its operations
this month, Nestlé has increased the volume it is pumping,
which has already damaged medicinal springs in the town’s
water park. The Colombia
Solidarity Campaign and representatives of the
Colombian Food Workers Union (Sinaltrainal) will describe
how trade unionists
have been targeted by paramilitary death squads after being
labelled as enemies of the company and "personae non gratae" by
Nestlé Colombia executives. Together with coffee growers' organisations in producing
countries, Oxfam International is running a campaign
attempting to persuade
governments, multilaterals and coffee roasters, including
Nestlé,
to pay a decent wage to suppliers and will present information
about this.
The
meeting is being conducted jointly with Ethical
Consumer Magazine and Corporate
Watch (which will have reports on
Nestlé available)
and Simpol-UK which
is developing policies for holding corporations to account
in the Simultaneous Policy.
Richard Howitt MEP, who organised a public hearing into
Nestlé before
the European Parliament Development and Cooperation Committee,
which Nestlé refused to attend
(see press release 23
November 2000), will speak at the
London meeting on his white paper aimed at holding corporations
accountable against international standards. Campaigners
will discuss strategies for taking action against Nestlé malpractice.
The meetings arise
from a similar gathering in Nestlé’s
home town of Vevey, Switzerland, in June 2004, hosted by
the Berne Declaration, Attac-Switzerland and Greenpeace
Switzerland where
Attac-Switzerland launched a book exposing the ‘Nestlé empire’. For
further information contact: Mike Brady,
Campaigns and Networking Coordinator,
Baby
Milk Action,
23 St. Andrew’s Street, Cambridge, CB2 3AX. Tel: 01223 464420.
Mobile: 07986 736179. Email: mikebrady@babymilkaction.org
Notes:
The workshop
at the European Social Forum
(ESF) will take place in Congress House 3, Bloomsbury
(see ESF
programme for a map). The meeting
in Edinburgh
will take place
at Teviot
Row House, Bristo Square (click
here for a map).
Franklin
Fredrick will also speak in the seminar "Water: Power-politics
and public services" on Friday 15 October,
13:00 - 15:00 at the ESF. For further information
on the water campaign
in Brazil see http://www.corporatewatch.org.uk/news/nestle_keep_at_it.htm and
Franklin's article in the Simpol-UK newsletter
at http://spdev.gn.apc.org/
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