Kit Kat spat goes viral despite Nestlé’s efforts
Now you see it, now you don’t. Wait: Now you do. A global game of Whack-a-Mole broke out Wednesday on the Internet when YouTube removed a gruesome anti-Nestlé commercial by Greenpeace after the multinational food giant complained, only to have viewers flock to the video-sharing site Vimeo.com, where the spot became an instant cause célèbre because of the reputed censorship. The 60-second video depicts a bored office worker enjoying a Kit Kat, which rather than being the popular chocolate-hazelnut ladyfinger-style confection, appears to be a chocolate-covered ape finger. As he munches on the treat, it oozes blood over his chin and across his keyboard, shocking his co-workers. “Have a break?” reads the on-screen text. “Give the orangu-tan a break.” (…) The protest action highlighted yesterday’s release of a Greenpeace report alleging that Nestlé and the Indonesian industrial giant Sinar Mas, which supplies the food company with palm oil and is also a major pulp-and-paper supplier, are “partners in crime,” whose actions may lead to the destruction of hundreds of thousands of hectares of rain forest. “Not only are these areas key habitat for orangutans, but also crucial carbon stores; the destruction of these areas is a major cause of Indonesia’s rocketing carbon emissions,” Greenpeace stated. The organization added that Sinar Mas has already been dropped by Unilever, Kraft, Sainsbury and Shell. A few hours after the video was posted to the Web, Nestlé said in a statement issued from its Swiss headquarters that it had “replaced the Indonesian company Sinar Mas as a supplier of palm oil with another supplier for further shipments,” and insisted that no palm oil from Sinar Mas had been used outside Indonesia. Still, it acknowledged that it could not guarantee that Sinar Mas palm oil wasn’t finding its way into the shipments of other suppliers it used. More…
News selected by Covalence | Country: Global | Company — Ethical Quote link: Nestlé | Source: The Globe and Mail
The protest action highlighted yesterday’s release of a Greenpeace report alleging that Nestlé and the Indonesian industrial giant Sinar Mas, which supplies the food company with palm oil and is also a major pulp-and-paper supplier, are “partners in crime,” whose actions may lead to the destruction of hundreds of thousands of hectares of rain forest. “Not only are these areas key habitat for orangutans, but also crucial carbon stores; the destruction of these areas is a major cause of Indonesia’s rocketing carbon emissions,” Greenpeace stated.
The organization added that Sinar Mas has already been dropped by Unilever, Kraft, Sainsbury and Shell.
A few hours after the video was posted to the Web, Nestlé said in a statement issued from its Swiss headquarters that it had “replaced the Indonesian company Sinar Mas as a supplier of palm oil with another supplier for further shipments,” and insisted that no palm oil from Sinar Mas had been used outside Indonesia. Still, it acknowledged that it could not guarantee that Sinar Mas palm oil wasn’t finding its way into the shipments of other suppliers it used.
