Here’s a list of Nestle brand names, if you’re interested: http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Boycotts/Nestle_boycott.html
I’ve been semi-boycotting Nestle for years. Boy, was I surprised to see Poland Spring on that list. I’m drinking a bottle of it right now…and sho’ 'nuff, it says Nestle right on the label!
I never buy anything Nestle.
I check too, on the lable, for the name.
I’m still pissed about killing all the infants, and basically telling the Government of Gabon that they were too powerless to matter in the Nestle scheme of things.
I really hate the company, and its board of directors, and I consider them to be murdering scum.
Tris
That is in no way contradictory to what Cranky said. Just because the goal of companies is to make a profit does not mean that companies should engage in every method of making money. Unless you’re arguing that companies have no social responsibility?
I think we can all be pretty sure that Nestle shareholders are richer than the average Ethiopian.
But anyway, isn’t your argument rather at odds with libertarianism? The share-holders made an investment of they’re own free will. Some of that went to Ethiopia. It didn’t work out, they lost their money. All investments contain risk. You take the profits with the loses.
Why should the Ethiopian govt and people accept the lose? Obviously they want to maintain inward investment and don’t want to get a reputation as a bad risk, but for Nestle to attempt to fully recoup all their loses, quite apart from sucking morally and bad PR, totally flys in the face of what investment, capitalism and indeed life is all about.
I’m not even making an argument really, because I don’t know enough about this case. I’m just saying that, in general, people ought to be held to their obligations and that breach should be supressed.
Who’s richer than whom isn’t really relevant, but I was just struck by the assertion that a wealthy corporation is taking advantage of a poor government. I only wanted to remind people that it is the shareholders and not the executive officers who will suffer from a default.
Why should Nestlé write off the debt? The Ethiopian Government owes the money, and they accept that they do.
But think of it in Public Relations terms. Ethiopia is possibly the poorest country in the world, and the population is currently on the verge of a famine worse than the ones in the 1980s. It just looks terrible. Nestlé’s legal and accounts teams should be being informed by their Marketing and PR people. What better show of corporate magnanimity and goodwill than a statement from Nestlé saying that they’re writing the debt off for Christmas? I’d certainly start buying their products again.
BTW if anyone feels strongly enough about this, there’s a very short and simple online petition here.
But Nestle didn’t own the company when it was nationalised. They bought the parent company which had owned it a decade later. I fail to see why the Ethiopean government should pay the scumbags anything.
Seems that they underestimated the bad publicity:
And just 'cos I hate Nestle and am feeling guilty for buying some Quality Street here are more links to people and organisations who are not too keen on Nestle.
Financial memories ar extremely long.
British and other foreign investors lost fortunes during the Russian Bolshevik revolution.
Throughout all th intervening years, holders of the share certificates pusued their claim for compensation, pretty much in expectation of failure.
Some share certificates actually became collectable items in their own right being very pretty and glimpses of a bygone age.
When communism finally collapsed, and the incoming Russian government needed money both to bail it out and to begin some process of reconstruction, guess what ?
The owners of those share certificates, and the investors in wholly private companies that were nationalised demended their compensation with renewed vigour.
The majority of the share certificates were still owned by institutions who were the most likey candidates to invest in Russia or lend money.
Russia had no option but to make arrangements to pay these people off, true it was no anything like the value of what was lost but it was a huge financial burden all the same, but the cost of not doing this would have been even greater.
So what Nestle is doing has precedent and is a standard practice, there are still claims outstanding against the Chinese government too, and I’d be willing to bet that other nations have had to face up to paying for the deficiencies of previous regimes, Spain would be one, following the death of Franco and the restoration of their monarchy, there will be plenty more.
:smack:
Not that it matters much now, but I’d like to take this opportunity to denounce the appalling spelling in my previous post.
In mitigation I present this thread, which has a bigger and more insidious effect on my posts than you’d think.
Still, what a :wally. Please accept these corrections:
their free will
losses (X2)
loss
flies
Thank you.
I guess the question comes down to was this money a loan or an investment?
A morgage is a loan, you have to pay it back.
The stock market is an investment, you can win or lose.
If Nestle loaned the money to the old govt of Ethiopia, they may have a case to get some of it back. (though I’m not sure about the issues of their being a different govt now…)
If it was an investment, where Nestle was planning to make money through risk, well the risk bit them in the ass, grow up and move on.
Either way, they should take the 1 mil with grace and get on with life.
Cranky, can I get links to the WHO guidelines and the US guidelines on formula advertising? I’m familiar with the Nestle issue (Aaron is not fed Carnation formula, in part for that reason.), but am not familiar with guidelines disallowing national advertising.
Robin
It was neither. Ethiopia nationalized a business back in the '70s. Nestle then acquired that business after it was nationalized and is now demanding payment.
Robyn,
As I understand it, formula manufacturers are supposed to advertise in specific ways in the U.S. Whether this is a compact they agreed to, or something an activist organization foisted onto them, I don’t know. Of course, formula companies market in all sorts of ways, some of which people find objectionable, but none of them take out magazine ads and such. Nestle chose to do so when it introduced Goodstart.
I am not sure the details of all of this are online–I think I got it from some books I have, and I’ll have to scrounge around to get the details.
There’s a 45% chance I am talking out of my ass and there is no binding agreement about marketing. The WHO problems, of course, are well-known and fairly well documented.
The puppet dog, whos name Ive forgotten, sings…
*N…E…S…T…L…E…SSSSSSSSSSS,
Nestle’s is the very most… heaaaarrrrt lessssssss.*
[snap!]
One must assume that corporate persons who place thier bottom line above thier humanity must be atheists. If not, they would be well advised to reconsider one or another of thier positions.
You are mad at Nestle because Gabonese mothers used dirty water and bottles to prepare formula?
Yes.
Of course, your simplistic statement of the facts in the matter ignore thirty years of marketing practices, and the responses of the governments of emerging nations to protect their people, who had no resources to obtain clean water. But most of all, you ignore the attitude of the Nestle corporation. They as much as publically admitted that they didn’t care what the government of Gabon said. And, they continue to market their formula products across Gabon’s borders because there was nothing Gabon could do about it, and they were not legally responsible for the deaths of infants, in any court having jurisdiction over the company.
But I will not buy their products, not now, not ever, and I will always advise others not to, as well.
Baby murdering scumbags, all of them.
Tris
But if I gave you a Nestle Crunch bar, you’d have at it, no?
No, I would give it back, and thank you for your intended kindness. But I won’t eat it. I would tell you why, if you asked, or if you seemed insulted.
Tris
I’m making jokes about a topic that is beyond joking. Sorry about that. Too much esspresso in me.
Not a problem, Robert, not a problem at all.
A lot of things I do and say elicit jokes. Hell, a lot of them probably deserve jokes. Just another wandering soul trying to do the human thing.
Be well, and, by they way,
Don’t buy diamonds, either.
Tris