Statement: Congress, Consumers Demand Bottling Reform...Now is the Time

STATEMENT BY KELLE LOUAILLIER, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR

At this week’s Congressional hearing on the regulation, marketing claims, and the transparency of the bottled water industry, two studies were released echoing the long-standing demands of Corporate Accountability International’s Think Outside the Bottle campaign, adding new impetus for the industry to correct course or face continued public backlash.

In response to the findings of these studies, Chairman Henry Waxman and Subcommittee Chair Bart Stupak have taken swift and deliberate action by issuing letters to major bottlers like Coke. These letters demand the release of information to Congress by August 10, including the specific sites and sources of corporations’ bottled water, as well as health and quality testing data that generally goes undisclosed to the public.

For three years, Think Outside the Bottle has demanded bottled water giants Coke, Nestlé and Pepsi not only label the source of their water, but publicly report on the health and quality of their water in the same manner that is required of public water systems. How better for people to determine whether the industry’s claims that what’s in the bottle is any better than what’s in the tap hold water? Especially given the toll bottled water marketing has taken on the public’s confidence in, and our elected leaders’ willingness to fund our vital public water systems.

Yet, movement from these corporations has been slow, and given the GAO’s findings – that federal consumer protections for bottled water are often less stringent than comparable protections for tap water – perhaps the industry’s foot-dragging and efforts to protect the status quo has something to do with their fear that the actual information won’t match their marketing claims.  

Whatever the case may be, this new information has spurred Congress to act, underscored the gravity and importance of the demands issued by the Think Outside the Bottle, and has shown just how powerful the 50,000 supporters of this campaign can be.   

Now is the moment for leading bottlers to decide: will they meet our campaigns demands, cooperate with this Congressional inquiry, and not stand in the way of efforts to improve oversight? Or, will they delay their response to Congress, work to dilute new FDA oversight powers, and continue to claim their own voluntary standards for transparency and disclosure are ‘adequate?’
 
Some bottlers are already getting it – people want change. For example, in response to Think Outside the Bottle, both Pepsi’s Aquafina in July of 2007 and Nestlé Pure Life last fall committed to changing their labels to show their brands come from public water sources. However, some bottlers are not; the last of the big three, Coke’s Dasani, has yet to respond to popular demand in this regard.

Overall, these have been but first steps towards bigger changes. There is more these bottlers can and should do, and Congress needs to continue showing leadership on this issue.  

 As a start, all three major bottlers can immediately step up to plainly provide water health and quality testing for their water in a manner that is comparable to what is required of public tap water.

And Coke can stop lagging behind its competitors and decide tomorrow to let people know Dasani comes from the same source as the tap.

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For a history of Think Outside the Bottle victories click here.

To read Campaigns Director Patti Lynn's letter to Coke CEO Muhtar Kent, click here.

To read the Government Accounting Office report click here.

To read the Environmental Working Group report click here.