CEO Unilever is asking for a solution for world hunger

Plans
involving corporate responsibility

As a child
Polman (56) wanted to be a priest or a doctor. But things turned out
differently: he went to work in consumer goods. First at Procter & Gamble,
than as financial director of Nestlé, to end up leading Unilever. It still may be
the reason why he strongly focuses on corporate responsibility.

That focus
shows up in several projects. The bouillon cubes of the company are enriched
with iron and iodine to prevent dwarfism. Another project is trying to improve
working conditions of employees of tea plantations, like in Tanzania. “How can
we train all those smallhold farmers, how can we can get sustainable practices
in soil management, water management and infrastructure to be competitive, for
the port to be upgraded efficiently, land to be set aside – the whole
ecosystem?,” said Polman.

In the
margin of G8 summit

Last
weekend Polman hosted the top of the New Alliance on Food Security and
Nutrition about world hunger at the British headquarters of Unilever. This is
an initiative that was started by the G8 which, next to several governments, involves
several companies such as Cargill, Syngenta and Monsanto. Its intention is to
help 50 million people out of poverty by 2022. The meeting was held only a few
days before the summit of the G8 in Northern Ireland.

The summit
delivered a promise of about 3.17 billion euro for projects. A big part of it –
about 600 million euro – came from British hedge fund TCI.

“Cynicism
lowest form of taking responsibility”

The summit
was the opportunity for Polman to reach out to the British government, together
with Peter Brabeck-Letmathe of Nestlé, to act against the use of food products
for the production of biofuels at the G8 summit.

There is
also some criticism: according to some groups the support of multinationals
like Unilever is only out of self-interest: “It is not easy: I knew that from
day one, and it is risky, because there are cynics out there, and I always say cynicism
is the lowest form of taking responsibility”, said Polman.