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INTERNATIONAL AGENCY OXFAM has said that the social and environmental policies of the world’s ten biggest food and beverage giants are failing millions of people who who supply land, labour, water and commodities needed to make their products.
The charity has ranked the agricultural policies, public commitments and supply chain oversight of of Associated British Foods (ABF), Coca Cola, Danone, General Mills, Kellogg’s, Mars, Mondelez, Nestlé, Pepsico and Unilever for the first time.
ABF, Kellogs and General Mills fared worst while Nestlé had the highest score at 54 per cent. In a statement today, Kellogg’s said it is committed to “a sustainable, ethical and transparent supply chain”.
“We are working more closely with the farmers who grow our grains to drive collaborative sustainability improvements,” the company said. “We also have a zero-tolerance position against forced labor, including slavery and human trafficking.”
Oxfam’s said while some of the companies have publicly committed to women’s’ rights, none have committed to eliminating discrimination against women throughout their supply chains. Furthermore none of the companies have declared a ‘zero tolerance’ against land and water grabs. The organisation said all ten companies are “overly secretive” about their agricultural supply chains.
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Companies are generally increasing their overall water efficiency but Oxfams said most have failed to put policies in place to limit their impact on local water sources. Only Pepsi has publicly recognised water as a human right and committed to consult local communities. Nestlé has also developed guidelines for its suppliers to manage water and was ranked top for policies on water.
While all of the companies have taken steps to reduce direct emissions, only five publicly report on agricultural emissions associated with their products.
None have publicly committed to pay a fair price to farmers or fair business arrangements with them across all agricultural operations. Only Unilever – which is top-ranked for its dealings with small-scale farmers – has specific supplier guidelines to address some key issues faced by farmers.
‘Take responsibility’
Chief Executive of Oxfam Ireland Jim Clarken said it is “time these companies take more responsibility for their immense influence on poor people’s lives”.
“Eighty percent of the world’s hungry people work in food production and these companies employ millions of people in developing countries to grow their ingredients,” he said. “They control hundreds of the world’s most popular brands and have the economic, social and political clout to make a real and lasting difference to the world’s poor and hungry.”
The ‘Behind the Brands’ campaign will launch in more than 12 countries including the US, Mexico, China, Brazil and across Europe.
Its first public action will target Nestle, Mondelez and Mars for “their failure to address inequality faced by women who grow cocoa for their chocolate products”. Oxfam said it is urging the three companies to do more to know and show how women are treated in their supply chains, create an action plan to address inequality for women in their supply chains and engage in advocacy to influence other powerful actors to do the same.
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Free market economics fall apart as consumers move up the hierarchy of needs and start thinking more what does this product say about me and less what does this product cost…
No it doesn’t Andrew, that’s just one of the many factors which effects demand. Companies can combat this with advertising etc. Free markets are the natural way things have always been, it is the attempt to regulate and stop natural order occurring (bank bailouts case and point) that have led us to this point.
Without free markets we would have no-one to borrow money from.
@John Duggan
Couldn’t agree with you there. I was making an observation on the damage the free market has done. Speculators have far too much power over our economies and in my opinion the power of the faceless markets has gone way too far.
More controls are needed, not less. Our economy is a good example of this, Anglo and Nib etc
@conor Murphy
I think the prime motivation is always profit and without controls they will always take profitable shortcuts regardless of the human cost. ( ie horse meat.) In these circumstances decency is often false and if not usually temporary.
John D. Free markets, what? So is the health industry s free market?
Is the oil industry a free market?
“Free market”. A term used to confuse the masses.
And bailouts are a direct consequence of interference in this so called free market. WTF are u talking about,,well u are half right by default I suppose
Your wrong, dead wrong and a walking testament to the power of misinformation campaigns designed to confuse & divide the slave working force!
No, the health service is not an industry in this country. The government provides it. Some people pay for speedier or non-essential services (myself included) via insurance. That is a choice afforded to us by the free market.
The free market is choice. Choice to buy, or not, or sell ,or not, at certain prices. A truly free market would have seen anglo go bankrupt. A truly free market would not have allowed the government, via lendings, to create such a deficit or to bail-out the banks. The markets are being restricted and artificially changed by the EU. But you can only hold the tide back for so long.
We are the market, it is not something somewhere we don’t control. We are the constituents of the free market.
Your missing the point Michael, but I think that’s how you roll ,looking at your other comments below. Consumers generally only care about price and quality, ethics come second. Suppliers/workers often get abused in pursuit of further profits.
I’m clearly not missing the point. Anyone who doesn’t understand what I mean does not understand economics. Every country that has ever succeeded has used capitalism and freedom to do so.
You didn’t give a solution, you gave the status quo. I think you don’t understand the bigger picture, the world is bigger than consumers. I’m not advocating an end to capitalism, but more controls are needed on businesses, particularly those operating across borders. We should not lose sight of what they are, and what their motivation is, profit. That doesn’t have to be a bad thing, as long as they are policed correctly and people aren’t fooled into thinking they are any different to that.
Profit first, people last! Gotta love the cold, ruthless nature of capitalism. Communism wasnt much better mind you. Thank god we have honourable politicians to look after our interests!
Can’t be sure of much these days Rory ,investigative journalism is dead and buried ,I’m happy enough to take the facts when they canbe found and form my own opinion,these big companies care as much for your well being as Monsanto cared about the people of Vietnam when it created agent orange.
7 billion people. That’s the elephant in the room. Fair-trade, organic and GM-free means that a large minority of the 7 billion will starve. But probably not in NW Europe, so let the others starve as long as we get a nice, smartly-designed self-congratulatory fair trade etc. symbol on our packaging.
There’s so little context for this report. Yes we can see the scores the companies got but what standards were Oxfam applying in their assessment criteria?
I’m not condoning actions these companies make that may hurt or take advantage of people but these results are completely ambiguous
Anybody watch Utopia recently and wonder how close to reality it was. The level of control and reach… Not necessarily the sterilisation bit… unless you saw Bill gates at the TED talks.
Private companies and corporations (apparently a corp is a person ??) have swallowed up so many of their competitors that they’ve become powerful behemoths. They can be very dangerous, and anyone who thinks otherwise, is a little naive.
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