Stamford Advocate - Group Presents Message to Nestle Waters

By Michael C. Juliano

Corporate Accountability International showed up Thursday morning with an S.O.S. to the world and Nestle Waters North America.

A few members from the Boston-based advocacy group arrived outside Nestle Waters' headquarters in Greenwich to deliver 10,000 messages in three large water cooler bottles asking the country's biggest bottled water company to stop undermining local control of water. Nestle Waters's Swiss parent company had its annual shareholders' meeting Thursday.

"At the forefront of these abuses is the fact that all across North America, Nestle, the world's largest food and beverage corporation, is staking claim to community water resources over local opposition," said Deborah Lapidus, campaign director for Corporate Accountability International's Think Outside the Bottle campaign. "We are here to demand this practice stop."

Nestle Waters North America, which received a similar visit two years ago from the group, is trying to add to its 23 bottling facilities in North America  by creating water-collection sites over opposition in New England, Michigan and Colorado, Lapidus said.

"These water grabs are having long-lasting impacts on ecosystems and water supplies long held in the public trust," she said as organization members held large signs emblazoned with messages such as "Water is for life, not for profit."

The group was joined by Terry Swier, a member of Michigan Citizens for Water Conservation, and Shelly Gobielle, a constituent
of Protecting Our Water and Wildlife Resources of Shapleigh, Maine.

Shapleigh passed an ordinance in 2006 to keep water under local control and prevent Nestle from building a bottling facility there, Gobielle said.

"But ever since we got the ordinance passed, Nestle has gone over our heads and straight to the state house, stocking every hearing with lobbyists and lawyers," she said. "They're working to undo everything that was accomplished at the grassroots level in communities throughout the state."

The Michigan group has taken Nestle Waters North America to court and spent more than $1 million in attorney and environmental expert fees over the past eight years as it fought the company's pumping of 720,000 gallons a day from the Great Lakes Basin, Swier said.

"Nestle is determined to run us dry in more ways than one, and no amount of talk about being a 'good neighbor' will change that fact," she said.

Soon after the group walked into Nestle Waters' lobby, three members of Corporate Accountability International, along with Gobielle and Swier, met with company representatives, including Chief Executive Officer and President Kim Jeffrey.

"We were able to give a progress report on the company's transparency in labeling the locations of its water sources and quality reporting since we last met two years ago," Jane Lazgin, director of Nestle Waters, said after a 90-minute meeting in a closed conference room. "Through the discussion. we identified increased public input and dialogue as a key area to work on for community spring water or bottling plant projects."

The company seems open to addressing in writing Corporate Accountability International's three demands of fully revealing their water sources on their bottles, reporting breaches in water quality and halting efforts to take control of water from local authorities, Lapidus said.

"We're just waiting for some clarifications and answers and for their actions to meet their words," Lapidus said.

To read the story in the Advocate, click here. 

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