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aul Polman, Unilever chief executive, likes to see himself as the social conscience of the business world: a former trainee priest, who criticises companies for prioritising profits over people and the planet.
But last week, the head of the Anglo-Dutch consumer goods conglomerate was put on the defensive himself. Mr Polman took to Twitter to rebut accusations that the maker of Lifebuoy and Dove soaps, Marmite and Ben & Jerry’s ice cream ignored its own ideals while handling the toxic legacy of a now-defunct thermometer factory in India.
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Unilever started feeling the heat a week ago after an eye-catching YouTube video called “Kodaikanal Won’t”, starring a spirited, 28-year-old sari-wearing Indian rapper, Sofia Ashraf, went viral. A former Ogilvy & Mather copywriter, Ms Ashraf accuses Unilever, one of her former employer’s biggest clients, of failing to clean up mercury waste from its former factory in the picturesque hill station of Kodaikanal, in Tamil Nadu state.
Viewed more than 2.2m worldwide since it was uploaded on July 30, the video has helped draw roughly 60,000 signatures to a petition urging Hindustan Unilever to clean the site and compensate workers affected by mercury exposure. It has also has prompted calls on social media for boycotts of Unilever products.
“Working actively solution kodai #Unileverpollutes for several years already,” Mr Polman tweeted on Thursday. “Determined to solve. Need others too and facts not false emotions.”
The crisis engulfing Unilever is a potent reminder of the risks of doing business in India — where Prime Minister Narendra Modi has urged foreign companies to invest in manufacturing — and of how even remote long-simmering disputes can be abruptly catapulted to the global stage through the power of social media.
“They relied on the invisibility of Kodaikanal and did not really think the matter could become this visible,” says Nityanand Jayaraman, a social activist deeply involved with the issue, who adds that activists have also been stunned by the video’s impact. “We did not think it could be this visible.”
Unilever’s woes in Kodaikanal began in March 2001, when residents discovered mercury-tainted waste glass from the factory in a nearby scrapyard. The yard was one of the many small informal recycling businesses that dominate waste management in India, where ostensibly stringent rules for handling toxic and industrial waste are barely enforced.
After the discovery, the thermometer factory was shut down, never to be reopened. Unilever admits that it found 5.3 metric tonnes of mercury-bearing scrap glass had been sold to the recycler, “in breach of our rules”.
By June 2001, Unilever had moved 7.4 tonnes of mercury-tainted glass, and the soil beneath it, from the scrapyard to the factory site. In 2003, Unilever sent 290 tonnes of mercury-bearing material from the defunct factory — including the scrap glass, effluent and broken thermometers — to the US — to recover the mercury and properly dispose of the waste.
But Unilever and local activists have been at odds over the final clean-up to remove residual mercury from the soil. The two sides have sparred over the appropriate standard for the process — that is, the acceptable level of residual mercury that would be left in the soil after the clean-up has been completed.
India locator
Unilever initially offered to clean the soil to the Dutch standard for a residential area, which was 10 microgrammes of mercury per kilogramme of soil, though it later urged a looser standard of 25mg/kg as the target.
In 2008, the Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board approved a Unilever plan to reduce mercury levels to 20mg/kg. But activists protested that the site — located in a sensitive watershed — should be restored to a pristine ecological level, with far less residual mercury.
Work on the soil remediation process was halted as local authorities struggled to bridge the gulf between the company and the community, and never restarted
Separately, Unilever has fought in court against claims for compensation from former workers, who say they are suffering the health effects of mercury exposure at the factory. Unilever says there is “no authoritative medical data from any report sho
High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut & paste the article. See our Ts&Cs and Copyright Policy for more detail. Email ftsales.support@ft.com to buy additional rights. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/0ec249f6-3ce9-11e5-8613-07d16aad2152.html#ixzz3xTeRzhIZ
P
aul Polman, Unilever chief executive, likes to see himself as the social conscience of the business world: a former trainee priest, who criticises companies for prioritising profits over people and the planet.
But last week, the head of the Anglo-Dutch consumer goods conglomerate was put on the defensive himself. Mr Polman took to Twitter to rebut accusations that the maker of Lifebuoy and Dove soaps, Marmite and Ben & Jerry’s ice cream ignored its own ideals while handling the toxic legacy of a now-defunct thermometer factory in India.
More
ON THIS STORY
Video accuses Unilever over toxic waste
Maggi noodles push Nestlé India into loss
Noodle recall prompts India toxin debate
ON THIS TOPIC
Production innovation gives Unilever sales edge
Unilever falls amid online grocery fears
Unilever aims to push deeper into skincare
Unilever finance chief Huët to step down
Sign up now
firstFT
FirstFT is our new essential daily email briefing of the best stories from across the web
Unilever started feeling the heat a week ago after an eye-catching YouTube video called “Kodaikanal Won’t”, starring a spirited, 28-year-old sari-wearing Indian rapper, Sofia Ashraf, went viral. A former Ogilvy & Mather copywriter, Ms Ashraf accuses Unilever, one of her former employer’s biggest clients, of failing to clean up mercury waste from its former factory in the picturesque hill station of Kodaikanal, in Tamil Nadu state.
Viewed more than 2.2m worldwide since it was uploaded on July 30, the video has helped draw roughly 60,000 signatures to a petition urging Hindustan Unilever to clean the site and compensate workers affected by mercury exposure. It has also has prompted calls on social media for boycotts of Unilever products.
“Working actively solution kodai #Unileverpollutes for several years already,” Mr Polman tweeted on Thursday. “Determined to solve. Need others too and facts not false emotions.”
The crisis engulfing Unilever is a potent reminder of the risks of doing business in India — where Prime Minister Narendra Modi has urged foreign companies to invest in manufacturing — and of how even remote long-simmering disputes can be abruptly catapulted to the global stage through the power of social media.
“They relied on the invisibility of Kodaikanal and did not really think the matter could become this visible,” says Nityanand Jayaraman, a social activist deeply involved with the issue, who adds that activists have also been stunned by the video’s impact. “We did not think it could be this visible.”
Unilever’s woes in Kodaikanal began in March 2001, when residents discovered mercury-tainted waste glass from the factory in a nearby scrapyard. The yard was one of the many small informal recycling businesses that dominate waste management in India, where ostensibly stringent rules for handling toxic and industrial waste are barely enforced.
After the discovery, the thermometer factory was shut down, never to be reopened. Unilever admits that it found 5.3 metric tonnes of mercury-bearing scrap glass had been sold to the recycler, “in breach of our rules”.
By June 2001, Unilever had moved 7.4 tonnes of mercury-tainted glass, and the soil beneath it, from the scrapyard to the factory site. In 2003, Unilever sent 290 tonnes of mercury-bearing material from the defunct factory — including the scrap glass, effluent and broken thermometers — to the US — to recover the mercury and properly dispose of the waste.
But Unilever and local activists have been at odds over the final clean-up to remove residual mercury from the soil. The two sides have sparred over the appropriate standard for the process — that is, the acceptable level of residual mercury that would be left in the soil after the clean-up has been completed.
India locator
Unilever initially offered to clean the soil to the Dutch standard for a residential area, which was 10 microgrammes of mercury per kilogramme of soil, though it later urged a looser standard of 25mg/kg as the target.
In 2008, the Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board approved a Unilever plan to reduce mercury levels to 20mg/kg. But activists protested that the site — located in a sensitive watershed — should be restored to a pristine ecological level, with far less residual mercury.
Work on the soil remediation process was halted as local authorities struggled to bridge the gulf between the company and the community, and never restarted
Separately, Unilever has fought in court against claims for compensation from former workers, who say they are suffering the health effects of mercury exposure at the factory. Unilever says there is “no authoritative medical data from any report sho
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