Coca Cola Abroad

The final post in this blog, taken posted first through my youtube account and then embeded here.

Enjoy.

Coca-Cola Responds to SINALTRAINAL

No business is immune to public opinion. Without people to buy their products businesses would serve no purpose, and therefore it is in a company’s best interest to meet their consumer’s expectation for practice and production quality. The Coca-Cola Company is aware of the accusations made against them by SINALTRAINAL, and have responded by investigating the accusations themselves as a basis for policy change.
In terms of public image alone, Coke’s most famous attempt to win back their appeal was with livepositively.com, a website that summarizes and promotes their humanitarian and environmental efforts around the world. For more information on this program see http://www.livepositively.com/#/home
A program like livepositively.com can easily be seen as an attempt to spin criticism away from the company with fancy marketing, however. Knowing that it would take more than just a website to win back a positive public image, the Coca-Cola Company requested an investigation by the United Nations labor panel of their Colombian bottling plants in April, 2006. As a third party, humanitarian organization, the United Nations (at first glance) is the perfect group to conduct this investigation in an unbiased, objective manner. Upon closer examination, however, the investigation does not hold up under scrutiny.
A link to the official report from this labor panel is provided at the bottom of this post. The first thing that you will likely notice as you read it is the neutrality of the language used. In my opinion this is paramount to providing good evidence in a case such as this without inspiring bias in the reader. There are not many other positive things to be said about this report, at least as far as addressing the primary issue is concerned. All things considered, this is a direct report of the working conditions within the plant that ignores any possibility of the violence towards trade and union leaders that has been reported since 1991. Since this is what initiated the first SINALTRAINAL lawsuit and spurred the killercoke movement, the failure to acknowledge its existence is a suspicious aspect of the report.
The significance of this failure was not lost on other evaluators of the SINALTRAINAL v. Coca-Cola lawsuit. The primary criticism of the report’s neutrality has been that the labor panel’s United States delegate was Ed Potter, who is also the director of global relations for the Coca-Cola Company. To make matters worse, this report was filed late due to a delay in the final investigation. Though there are many reasons why this could be the case, one possibility is that extra time was needed to make the report appear neutral, either because the evidence itself appeared biased or because members of the panel were not able to reach agreement on the issues.
I am not satisfied by Coca-Cola’s efforts to investigate the allegations made against them. The bottom line is that third party organizations do not answer to any authority other than the person who is hiring them. They are able to set their own quality and ethical restrictions on their service. In order for me to be convinced that Coca-Cola had nothing to do with the violence occurring in Colombia there must to be an investigation conducted by a US government organization.

http://www.laborrights.org/sites/default/files/publications-and-resources/evaluation%20mission%20Coca-cola%20bottling%20plants%20in%20Colombia%20(2).pdf

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15 References

1. http://www.killercoke.org/

-Killer Coke has provided a good range of general information regarding the Coca-Cola Company’s activity in Columbia. There is a concise summary of Coke’s alleged crimes, but there is a heavy bias against the company, and this must be kept in mind as you view the website.

2. http://inventors.about.com/od/cstartinventions/a/coca_cola.htm

-The above link takes you to an abbreviated history of Coca-Cola, both the product and the company. It is by no means in depth, but it does give important dates and basic information that is useful for gaining perspective on the company’s origins and growth.

3. http://www.fromwhatiheard.com/2007/03/14/the-effects-drinking-a-coke-has-on-your-body/

-This website is not particularly academic, but it does give a good, semi-scientific outline of Coca-Cola’s effects on the human body, which are distressing and numerous. Though it does not help with the Coca-Cola v. SINALTRAINAL debate, it does provide a different perspective against Coca-Cola’s “feel good” advertising campaign.

4. http://www.coca-cola.com/index.jsp

-The Coca-Cola website provides an unabridged glimpse into their ideal public image. A lot if what I saw on here influenced my thinking about how the company wants us to view them.

5. http://www.mycokerewards.com/home.do

-Another glimpse of Coca-Cola from behind enemy lines. The MyCokeRewards program allows buyers to cash in on extra benefit for their products. Though again not essential to the SINALTRAINAL debate, it’s another interesting look at what Coke provides its customers outside of the product itself.

6. http://www.livepositively.com/#/home

-This website was crucial to my blog on public opinion and how it affects the reaction to a company’s practices. Many of the humanitarian and philanthropic actions that Coke claims to sponsor here are in direct contradiction to accusations made against them by groups like SINALTRAINAL.

7. http://www.sinaltrainal.org/

-Once you run this page through a Google translator it provides one of the most complete and useful databases of Coke’s crimes, as collected by the SINALTRAINAL organization. I have come back here numerous times for dates, lists of martyrs within the organization, and a straight from the source voice of the workers in Columbia.

8. http://www.globalpolicy.org/component/content/article/162/28046.html

-This article gives a good overview of Coca-Cola’s presence in India. The dates and figures provided here give it a solid, scientific background that lends veracity to the article.

9. http://www.indiaresource.org/campaigns/coke/2003/communitiesprotest.html

-The article provides another outline of Coca-Cola’s presence in India, though this section is specific to Tamil Nadu. The claims concern exploitation of the water system in a drought ridden region, which is an obvious argument against the “water conversation efforts” claimed by livepositively.com.

10. http://www.waronwant.org/news/campaigns-news/15153-coca-cola-drinking-the-world-dry/

-This article provides more information about Coca-Cola and water conservation, though this one takes a broader stance than the other two, referring to multiple countries that have Coca-Cola bottling plants on their soil. The visual images lend a personality to the arguments.

11. http://www.mindfully.org/Water/2005/India-Coca-Cola-Pepsi14mar05.htm

-Another article on water tables and India, though this one provides information on the history of the Coca-Cola Company in India, from when the company was first voted off of Indian soil in 1977 to their return in 1993.

12. http://www.nike.com/nikeos/p/nike/en_US/?

-Though it is a different company, I have referenced Nike several times in my blog, comparing the company’s public image with Coca-Cola’s and using this as a starting point to compare the public reaction to each company’s humanitarian violations.

13. http://mba.tuck.dartmouth.edu/pdf/2004-1-0085.pdf

-A highly detailed and academic perspective on Coca-Cola in India, this file provides numerous quality references and facts about the company’s presence in the country, as well as its response to the recent college campus boycotts.

14. http://www.labournet.net/world/0404/coke1.html

-Another high quality document, this is a collection of the letters of protest sent from SINALTRAINAL to the Coca-Cola Company after the alleged attacks in Columbia. This was one of the first documents that I found related to the issue.

15. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinaltrainal_v._Coca-Cola

-Though there is a stigma against Wikipedia in the academic community, all of the dates in the grid at the bottom of the page are correct, so I use it as a reference point when I am completing a blog and a fact slips my mind.


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Coca Cola Cares

http://www.livepositively.com/#/home

If you follow the link above, you will enter livepositively.com, a website owned and operated by the Coca Cola Company. By creating a profile, you are able to give the Coca Cola Company feedback about their products, become involved in community improvement projects, volunteer as a helper for youth and medical charities, and enter My Coke Reward points (a reward system for drinking Coca Cola products) to benefit local schools. By maintaining a website like this, the Coca Cola Company is able to support its image as a caring, environment-oriented company that is striving to be green despite the difficult economic times.
The image of a caring business is an example of a social myth. Though they may be willing to partake in charity events or donate resources towards worthwhile causes, the Coca Cola Company remains a business. Their main goal is to make money and move product however they can. Coca Cola appears to be going the extra mile with this website; browsing around, you can see a plethora of Coke-sponsored activities ranging from recycling to civic action. With society moving more and more rapidly towards green technology and business practices, however, this is revealed as nothing more than a clever way to maximize profits by meeting the popular expectation. With college campus boycotts of Coca Cola products becoming more and more prevalent, the company needs every bit of popular praise it can get.
If you follow the “planet” heading on the aforementioned website and click on the section labeled “water conservation,” you will find an overview of the Coca Cola Company’s efforts to maintain local water tables around its bottling plants. With an average consumption of over three liters of water for ever liter of Coca Cola produced, it makes sense that the company would be concerned for this resource.
Despite water’s necessity to the company and their claims of sustainability, many local communities in proximity to Coca Cola bottling plants have protested the company’s presence, claiming that the plants negatively impact local water tables. The Coca Cola Company was ejected from India in 1977, and all plants in that nation were shut down. During this period without the company’s presence, water levels were kept at a relatively steady level. The company was able to negotiate its return, however, after which the water levels suffered once again. A plant in the village of Kaladera, located in the semi-arid desert state of Rajasthan, began functioning in 2000, and by 2005 the local water tables had dropped by over ten meters. Why would a company that claims to be so committed to sustainable water practices open a plant in a desert state, let alone accept such a dramatic decline in water supply?
Information on the Coca Cola’s practices in Indian is not nearly prevalent enough to compete with the company’s “feel good” advertising campaign, and the myth of Coca Cola as a caring company remains. With protest groups unable to match the Coca Cola Company’s annual advertising budget of two billion dollars, it is likely to remain for a very long time, until enough proof of their actions overseas is presented and the general public is made aware of the unseen costs tied to their bottled drink.


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Public Oppinion

The public image of a company plays a heavy role in the perception and interpretation of that company’s actions. Nike Inc. has endured heavy criticism since the 1990s for the human rights violations and child labor usage in their overseas factories. Public response to this has been one of condemnation, including boycotts on college campuses, undercover footage taken within Nike production facilities, and even the competitive withdrawal of Chinese Olympian, Liu Xiang, who protested Nike sponsorship and apparel at the 2008 Summer Games.
Compared to this, the critical action taken against Coca-Cola for the alleged kidnapping, torture, and murder of SINALTRAINAL employees in Columbia has been relatively weak: an overturned lawsuit, several college boycotts that are struggling to take hold, and a committed critical website. Why are people hesitating to attack Coca-Cola at the same level that Nike has experienced? Watch the below videos and consider their messages as you do:





Nike’s commercial is intimidating, aggressive, powerful, and serious. Every mask that appears on a player’s head symbolizes the dedication and sacrifice that they have put into their sport to become a competitive force. It establishes Nike’s image as an uncompromising, hard-hitting apparel source for athletes that aren’t afraid to do what they must to rise to the top. It is not too far of a stretch to imagine that a company which provides such hard-hitting apparel to their customers would be similarly efficient and uncompromising in their business practice.
The Coca-Cola commercial sends a completely different message. They suggest that their product should be associated with whimsical ideals, colorful imagery, fanfare, comedy, and general good nature. With an image like this, it would be difficult to imagine successfully charging the Coca-Cola Company with hiring a paramilitary force to commit acts of terrorism in the name of lower production cost.
This advertising driven image campaign is not limited only to commercials. Take a minute to visit the home pages of each company’s website, which are linked below.

http://store.nike.com/index.jsp?country=US&cp=USNS_KW_0611081619&lang_locale=en_US

http://www.coca-cola.com/index.jsp

The first thing you see on Nike’s page is a sepia colored image of an exhausted boxer leaning on the ropes after his sparring match. Next to him is the phrase “determined to dominate,” which is referring to the new Manny Pacquiao clothing line. Browsing through the other title pages show similarly success oriented promotion for their clothing line. This campaign reinforces the same themes that were mentioned before and helps to establish Nike as a ruthless, assertive company in the public eye.
The Coca-Cola website has a more direct message: “open happiness.” The subtext of this phrase is so clear that it hardly needs to be restated: drinking Coca-Cola will make you happy. With an advertising campaign that directly associates the product with good feelings, it is easy to see what sort of public opinion would form.
It is hard to believe that something like public perception can influence whether or not a company is held accountable for their actions. The effects are visible, however, and we should all try to keep an unbiased and objective view when regarding a company’s actions outside of the shopping aisle.

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A Brief History of Coca Cola vs. SINALTRAINAL

Coca Cola was developed in 1886 by John Pemberton. Originally meant to be a patent medicine, its bitter taste was unappealing, causing Pemberton to add more and more sugar and sweetener to the product until it became less medicinal and more confectionary. It quickly grew from its roots at drug store soda fountains, becoming a profitable and popular beverage. After Pemberton sold the recipe to Asa Candler the popularity continued to grow. During the first decade alone Candler increased profits by four thousand percent. With an innovative distribution method of selling cola syrup to bottlers who manufactured and distributed individual bottles, Coca Cola became available across the United States. The company’s growth has continued steadily, and today The Coca Cola Company is the largest beverage produce in the world, and over one billion Coca Cola Company products are consumed every day.

After entering the world market, The Coca Cola Company explored new options for production and distribution. Like several similarly successful American companies during the twentieth century, The Coca Cola Company invested in bottling plants off of United States soil. The chief appeal of this outsourcing is that they need only meet the labor regulations of whatever foreign soil they are occupying, which reduces production cost for the company.

Trade and labor unions exist in other countries, but they do not enjoy the same level of safe representation and influence as a comparable US organization would. An example would be SINALTRAINAL (Sindicato Nacional de Trabajadores de la Industria de Alimentos, or The National Union of Food Industry Workers) which is a Colombian organization that has attempted to create union for the workers in Coca Cola bottling plants as well as several other food corporations within the country. Originally founded by Nestle workers in 1982, SINALTRAINAL has faced an enormous amount of opposition towards their efforts to establish a safe and fair work environment. Their official website has an entire section devoted to “martyrs” to their cause. Twenty three people are listed as having died to promote the efforts of the organization, and there are more besides who have been displaced from their land or imprisoned.

The first recorded case of violence at the Colombian bottling plant occurred in 1990, when a union worker was killed. Response was limited as there was little that could be done. No further violence occurred until the end of 1994 and the beginning of 1995, a stretch of time in which three more workers were killed. The Coca Cola Company was oddly quiet during this five year period and barely responded to the fact that their workers were being killed.

On December 5^th, 1996, Isidro Gil was killed. Gil was the leader of SINALTRAINAL in northwestern Colombia, where the Coca Cola bottling plant is located. Allegedly he was killed on Coca Cola Company property after failed negotiations for the formation of a union to protect the bottling plant workers. After his death, the nearby SINALTRAINAL headquarters were burned to the ground. In addition, his brother (who had been active in the negotiations) was pressured with death threats to leave the union, and his wife was dragged from their home and killed. Two days after this string of violence, workers in the bottling plant were gathered by paramilitary forces and made to sign resignations from the SINALTRAINAL union.

SINALTRAINAL eventually accused The Coca Cola Company of ordering the AUC (Audtodefenas Unidas de Colombia, or the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia) to carry out these attacks on the plant workers in order to drive down wages through fear tactics. With the help of the United Steelworkers of America, SINALTRAINAL filed a lawsuit in Miami on July 20^th, 2001. Evidence was difficult to come by, but it was not lack of support for the SINALTRAINAL allegations that caused the case to be overturned by the district court in 2003. Instead, the ruling was based on the fact that these crimes in Colombia were too far removed from the Atlanta, Georgia based company, and therefore were not the concern of the American legal system.

Killer Coke was launched one month after this ruling with the intent of spreading public knowledge of The Coca Cola Company’s crimes and violations. Their efforts have caused twenty three college campuses to boycott the beverage so far. In addition to this, Costco Wholesale has recently refused to carry Coke products. More work needs to be done before conditions for the workers will change, but efforts are being made.

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The Last Can of Coca Cola

It’s a hot summer day. Heat is rising from the asphalt in vapor clouds. You’ve sweat enough to soak through your clothes. You reach into the ice chest at your side, feeling chilled water and a few remaining ice cubes as they bump into your hand. At the bottom of the chest you touch metal, and triumphantly you raise the last remaining can of Coca Cola. The top pops and hisses, and you enjoy gulp after gulp cooling ambrosia.

Would it surprise you to learn that the company behind this delicious beverage, a symbol of relaxation and refreshment worldwide has recently been accused of the kidnapping, torture, and murder of union leaders at their Colombian bottling plants? If you follow the link posted at the bottom of this page you will find Killer Coke, a website dedicated to investigating and exposing these acts to the general public. In conjunction with SINALTRAINAL (the National Union of Food Industry Workers) they hope to establish humane working conditions within the bottling plants and force Coca Cola to accept responsibility and face the consequences of their actions.

For a company that made four billion dollars last year with an advertising campaign based on commercials associating Coke with summer days, sports events, and symbols of American values, this information is shocking. It is hardly the first claim of harsh conditions in overseas plants that produce American goods; the Nike brand has been synonymous with sweatshop labor, and has contracted with companies in China, Vietnam, Indonesia, and Mexico, moving their company whenever workers organize and demand improved conditions that threaten profit and cheap production prices. Despite this however, there have been no claims leveled against Nike that compare to those brought against Coke. The chief similarity between the two companies seems to be that neither has seen more than a passing dip in their profits since these accusations have been made.

When I talk to people about their thoughts on what Coke is doing, it becomes easier to imagine how these companies have managed to maintain their profits in the face of a humanitarian crisis. A concerning number of responses have been that Coke is a delicious drink, why should we care how it arrives in our glasses? How can this sort of mentality be acceptable in the world today? A simplified answer would be that the workers are too far out of our sight. These are hardly the first people to die off of American soil due to poverty conditions and oppression, so why are they special? A simplistic answer is rarely the one that works, so I will not concern myself with one. My goal is only to aid in the exposure of this problem and to encourage dialogue around it.

The purpose of this blog is to continue the investigation and analysis begun by Killer Coke, to introduce the topic in another forum, to examine the conditions that have allowed lower class workers to be put in these situations, and to offer my own opinion and analysis of the information presented for and against Coke as it is made apparent. Expect more to follow in the coming weeks.

http:/www.killercoke.org/