Friday, December 19, 2008

Three awards

News of three awards.

Firstly, Nestlé has won yet another shaming award. This time it is from a consumer group in Taiwan. The Taipei Times reports:
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/archives/2008/12/20/2003431591

---
In the private sector, RT Mart, Fonterra and Nestle Taiwan all received the “Very Black Award” — “black” standing for black-hearted products — by the foundation for poor business practices during the melamine scandal.
---

Nestlé had criticised a delisting order from the food safety authorities, claiming the level of melamine in its products was within safe limits. Nestlé did say it would comply with the order, however. For more on the melamine scandal, analysis of the levels found in different products and Nestlé's response see the Nestlé Critics website at:
http://www.nestlecritics.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=56&Itemid=1

Meanwhile in Argentina, our partners in the International Baby Food Action Network (IBFAN) are in the news for a breastfeeding photo compeitition. They received a silver medal from the World Alliance for Breastfeeding Action in a 'marathon' during World Breastfeeding Week for staging the long-running event. See the report at:
http://www.anbariloche.com.ar/noticia.php?nota=6748

Finally, a reader of this blog has alerted me to a report by someone tracking the reputation of companies at:


This includes the following comments on the authority of blogs that are critical of the aggressive marketing strategies used for Cow & Gate (a brand owned by Danone):
http://bacatu.blogspot.com/2008/09/perceptions-of-cow-and-gate.html

---
Both websites have a greater authority than cowandgate.co.uk measured by how many sites are linking to them and how authoritative those sites are, on average.
  • Half Pint Pixie has 233 sites linking to it which are (on average) 240 times more authoritative than that site
  • Boycott Nestle has 167 / 114
  • Cow and Gate has just 71 / 60
---

So hurrah for us and raspberries for the misbehaving baby food companies.

No comments: