New Delhi: 16th September 2009: More than 500 consumers today pledged to return their Nestlé products to the company’s corporate office in Rajiv Chowk today, even as Nestlé continued to deny the consumers their right to GM free products. Greenpeace volunteers, who acted on behalf of more than 20,000 consumers across the country, placed the rejected products marked with question marks, into larger than life nests in front of the office building, parodying Nestlé’s well known logo. This symbolized questionable contents of Nestlé products owing to the company’s failure to have a GM free policy.
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- Greenpeace activists outside the Nestle office with Nests full of returned products
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- Big question marks to symbolise the uncertainty of the GE free nature of Nestle products
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- Nearly a thousand people returned Nestle products
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- Until Nestle gets rid of double standards and has a policy on par with their European policy, the safety of their products will remain a question
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- Greenpeace activists waiting to get a response from Nestle
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- The products were tagged with the names of those who pledged to return Nestle products
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- Nestle showed no interest in listening to their customers
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- Products sent in by many Nestle consumers didn’t seem to move the company to change their policy
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- Instead the police were brought in to get rid of consumer pressure!
Greenpeace India released the Safe Food Guide in New Delhi recently ranking 17 major food companies as ‘green’ or ‘red’ on the basis of their policies regarding the use of genetically modified ingredients. Only two companies Nestlé, and Hindustan Unilever had indicated a policy which favoured the use of GMOs.
Hindustan Unilever, which was initially slotted in the ‘red’ list, has since clarified to Greenpeace that it does not use any GM ingredients in its products. This clarification by HUL has made Nestlé, with brands like Maggi, Cerelac, Lactogen, Kitkat and Nescafe, under its umbrella, one of the big brands, openly supporting the use of GM ingredients in its products.
As a result of the pro GM food position indicated by Nestlé, thousands of consumers across the country have started demanding that Nestlé, in sync with its policies in the European Union and Russia, should go GM free in India as well. Over 21000 emails have been sent to the Chairman and Managing Director of Nestlé India, Mr. Antonio Waszyk demanding that Nestlé India go GM free.
Last week, Greenpeace in China discovered Nestlé’s baby food products contaminated with GM ingredients. Like India, Nestlé has had a history of disregard to consumers in China. Soon after the news of this scandal, over a 100 people called the Nestlé India head office demanding a GM free policy from the company.
“Overwhelming public opinion shows that consumers reject GM food as unsafe and unnatural. Nestlé needs to respect consumer choice and declare itself GM free like it has in Europe and Russia. Anything else will be merely a manifestation of double standards. If MTR foods can, why can’t Nestlé” said Jai Krishna, campaigner with Greenpeace India.
(1) Of the 17 major food brands, 6 are in the ‘green’ list. 11 companies are in the red list. In the green list, MTR is the only company to have a policy rejecting GMOs in their food products. For the entire guide log on to www.safefoodnow.org
(2) http://www.greenpeace.org/china/en/news/nestle-baby-food
India has not approved any GM food crops as of today. However there are more than 11 food crops which have been under hundreds of acres of field trials. In addition to this, unauthorized imports of packaged foods and even grains, makes the threat of contamination a reality.
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Subir. Subir said: RT @greenpeaceindia 100s of Nestle consumers returned their Nestle products, however Nestle did not seem to care. http://bit.ly/17X74E [...]
Hi,
I don’t seem to understand the real orientation behind this, Could some one please tell me what is wrong with the GM food.
Hi Kishan,
please read more about GM food at http://greenpeace.in/safefood/faq/
Also check out http://www.gmwatch.org/10-reasons-why-we-dont-need-gm-foods
GM food is yet another manifestation of Industrial intensive modes of food production. It represents all that is wrong with agriculture be it threat to human health and biodiversity/environment or threat to our farmers from corporate control.
Its high time that we consumers start asking that simple question what is in our food than just asking whats for lunch/ dinner.Its high time that we try understanding how our food is produced.
sorry my last post missed a word in the second sentence, a crucial one ,that distinguishes between good and bad ways of food production/agriculture.
Please read it as “GM crops represents all that is wrong with ‘intensive’ agriculture ,be it the threat to human health adn biodiversity/environment or the threat to our farmers from corporate control.”
Similar to the Non-Veg/Veg symbol Red/Green, we should have GM/Non-GM markings. We should make this mandatory. I am sure customers will prefer the Non-GM food.
Good work Guys Keep it up…..!
[...] the entire News Release at http://greenpeace.in/safefood/news-blog/returned-to-sender/ Bookmark [...]
hiii iam the part of this action…pls support us
[...] Consumers reject GM food, demand Nestlé India go GM free. [...]
I’m all for banning the propagation of GE food to an unquestioning and barely educated market, but where does Nestle say they use it?????
Someone picked this campaign and channeled a lot of money, time, web space and riled supporters into it and now GP has to find the most ridiculous and twisted ways to keep the campaign afloat.
A word to GP: Honesty would help, come clean… Do not slander a company for something they don’t do. Reword your poll statement. Apologize to the company and clear their name.
Reaffirm the stance of the poll-ers, hopefully that would be ‘Indians never would want GE food’.
And then bow out!
Maybe you’d salvage some of your credibility and those of the poor ‘educated’ celebrities you’ve roped in, who by the looks of your site are made to seem like they support the ban Nestle campaign!
@Mary: why are you so hell bent on declaring your ignorance all over this space??? Greenepeace has clearly said that what they want from Nestle is a long term policy which they are not ready to give! As a consumer, I also want the same. If nestle says there is no GM in its products right now, thats just not enough for me!
Nestle should rewrite their core busciness policy declaring that their products are GM free.
nice article , nestle should keep the same policy all over the world.