Story filmed by RTS and BBC airs in UK on “Panorama” tonight
Switzerland’s largest company in lengthy rebuttal says not so
DRC copper mining at Kamatanda, near Likasi in Katanga province (mine NOT owned by Glencore), 17 January 2011 - Photo: Carême/Meinrad Schade
ZURICH, SWITZERLAND – Glencore, Switzerland’s largest company in terms of turnover and reportedly the supplier of 50 percent of the world’s copper, is accused of indirectly buying material from an “artisanal mine” in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) that uses freelance miners as young as 10 years old. The company reacted with a lengthy refutation, not of the Glencore report (pdf) by two Swiss groups, but to a show based on that information, to be aired tonight by the BBC.
Glencore and XStrata are presenting their proposed merger to shareholders in May, prompting closer scrutiny of the Glencore’s reputation in the area of ethical business practices.
The merger would make the new $90 billion company the world’s third largest mining and raw materials group.
Both are based in Zug. Xstrata’s roots lie in a firm called Südelektra, founded in 1926. The name was changed in 2002 and the company went public 10 years ago.
The accusations of child labour and other illegal or at best dubious practices on the part of Glencore are made in a lengthy report issued 16 April by two politically active Swiss charities who are noted for their research “into the causes of poverty that affects large sections of the population”, says Zewo-certified Swiss Catholic Lenten Fund (Carême in French and Fastenopfer in German), which issued the report with Bread for All.
The report is the result of six months of investigation into the company’s work in the DRC, a followup to an earlier report when Glencore was listed on the stock market in 2011. Among its findings:
- copper from a mine where one-third of the miners are children, working in unsafe conditions, is making its way into Glencore’s supply lines; Glencore owns the mine, which is dormant, and the company says it has been overrun by artisanal miners, industry lingo for freelancers who mine and sell as best they can
- ” In one of Glencore’s processing plants in Luilu, sulphuric acid is discharged untreated into the river of the same name, with devastating consequences for the environment and the people living in the surrounding villages, who have lost an important water source.” The company says the problem pre-dates its ownership and has now been dealt with but film footage reportedly shows otherwise
- Glencore is accused of not respecting labour laws and of using fiscal practices that deprive the country of income that could replace aid money: “Glencore lawfully pays duties in the DRC in the form of licence fees and import/export tax. However, with the company shifting its profits made in the Congo through transfer pricing between its subsidiaries and into tax havens, the Congolese state’s according to calculations of the Swiss Catholic Lenten Fund and Bread for all loss in dividends and tax on profits amounted to around196 million US dollars in the last two years.”
Swiss legal loopholes for overseas subsidiaries targeted
The report notes that
Zurich company to help increase Unilever’s sustainability efforts
ZURICH, SWITZERLAND – Barry Callebaut and Unilever Monday 23 January signed a long-term partnership agreement that will double the cocoa and chocolate the Swiss-based company delivers to the Dutch-based consumer goods and foods producer. Barry Callebaut will invest CHF22 million under the terms of the agreement to ramp up to “provide 70 percent of Unilever’s global cocoa and chocolate products”.
Unilver is looking to ice cream products in particular to double sales while reducing environmental impact. The Zurich chocolate company has already helped build sales significantly with the Magnum ice cream line. Unilever has come under pressure, along with other multinationals, for its use of chocolate that is not certified Fair Trade. The company notes on its web site that “cocoa accounts for 4 percent of our total volume of agricultural raw materials. We buy 1 percent of global production, 95 percent of which is used in our ice cream, including in our biggest global ice cream brand Magnum and in Ben & Jerry’s.”
Monday’s press release from Barry Callebaut about the new partnership terms notes that “Barry Callebaut has also been working closely with Unilever to meet its sustainable cocoa sourcing commitments.”
CNN Friday 20 January ran a major investigative news background story on child labour in the cocoa industry, which has resulted in some calls for boycotting chocolate. As part of the network’s series, it contacted the chocolate industry for companies’ responses.
The Zurich company has been addressing the issue for some time and has considerable consumer information on the industry-wide problem.
Details of the deal were not revealed.
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – The annual ILO (International Labour Organization) opens Wednesay 1 June in Geneva and it is sparking more than usual interest, in part because it is the 100th such session for one of Geneva’s oldest international organizations and partly because it is bringing to town Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
Two items that are high on the agenda are approval of recommendations and eventually an international convention on domestic workers, and the employment problems of large numbers of displaced persons who have recently fled fighting in Middle Eastern countries. Also on the agenda and likely to garner public attention: the situation of workers in the occupied territories and a new report on hazardous child labour.
Swiss aid group calls for Zimbabwe to be barred from Kimberly Process diamonds, cites State torture, child and forced labour
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The Indian ministry of commerce is the latest to move against the Zimbabwe diamond trade, asking the country’s traders and jewelry exporters Thursday 9 December to “bide their time” until the Kimberly Process (KP), which certifies diamonds, clarifies Zimbabwe’s compliance, according to SouthWest Radio Africa. Monday the Swiss group Bread for All, a humanitarian alliance of the country’s Protestant churches, called for the Swiss market not to accept Zimbabwe diamonds, citing continued human rights abuse in the Marange diamond area. Switzerland imports $676 million in rough diamonds a year and exports close to $1 billion, in addition to its finished diamonds market.
India imports more diamonds than any other country in the world, based on 2009 KP statistics.
Zimbabwe was barred from KP trading in November 2009 because of alleged human rights abuses at its Chiadzwe mines in the east of the country. The KP’s 49-member group, of which Switzerland and India as well as Zimbabwe are members, ruled in July 2010 that Zimbabwe could resume limited exports, following a visit by a monitor in September. The Indian government’s call to its diamond business is reportedly based on ongoing negotiations between Zimbabwe, which threatens to ignore the KP certification process, and the KP, which wants Zimbabwe to limit exports to better monitor the trade there.
The Kimberly Process describes itself as “a joint governments, industry and civil society initiative to stem the flow of conflict diamonds–rough diamonds used by rebel movements to finance wars against legitimate governments. The trade in these illicit stones has fuelled decades of devastating conflicts in countries such as Angola, Cote d’Ivoire, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Sierra Leone.”
Bread for All has appealed to the Swiss government to insist as a member of the KP not only that Zimbabwe be barred from certification by the Kimberly Process but also to push for a change to the KP rules, which currently define “blood diamonds” only as those handled by rebel groups to finance their wars against governments.
The Swiss organization says it has evidence from its Geneva-based partner, Zimbabwe Advocate, of daily instances of human rights abuse since 2008 by the Zimbabwe government’s army in mines in the east of the country, around Marange. The “human rights violations include forced labour, child labour, torture, beatings and rape. In addition, soldiers are forcing minors to work for them and they are organizing illegal trafficking in diamonds,” according to Bread for All.
Zimbabwe minister berates visiting Norwegians for questions over abuse
Not enough of this around, says ILO
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Unemployement levels in G-20 countries would be between 29 and 43 percent higher without the economic stimulus packages put in place by most governments following the economic crisis unleashed by the fall of investment bank Lehman Brothers one year ago, the International Labour Organization (ILO) announced today 21 September. The ILO still foresees the number of unemployed globally at between 219 and 241 million people, an increase of between 39 and 61 million unemployed.
