“Investigate where the sugar comes from”
Oxfam’s report was published as part of the Belgian Fair
Trade Week, during which the company hopes to bring malpractices to light and possibly halt them. “We have discovered that companies like Coca-Cola, PepsiCo and
Associated British Foods are using land in developing countries, bought through
intermediary companies”, states campaign manager Bert Dhondt in a Belgian radio show.
“The land belongs to local
communities that have been chased off the land. We want these soda manufacturers
to better investigate where their sugar comes from exactly and to be
transparent about it.”
“Utmost respect for rights”
Coca-Cola immediately denied any ties to possible land theft: “We categorically deny any accusation
stating that we are directly involved in land theft”, Coca-Cola Belux’ Aurélie
Gerth told deredactie.be. “Coca-Cola has the utmost respect for the rights
of all communities and populations and strives to guarantee the highest level
of responsibility throughout our entire supply chain.”
Coca-Cola revealed that it had already proposed a plan to Oxfam with
concrete steps to prevent land theft, “including
a higher level of transparancy in regards to the supply chain”.
