DEVELOPMENT: When Education Is Not So Sweet

BRUSSELS, Jun 29 (IPS) - A major Belgian retail firm has been accused of misleading its customers by implying that its sales of Malawian sugar will benefit education projects in that country.

Colruyt, a supermarket chain operating in Belgium and France, sells sugar and several other food and drink items from poor countries as part of a range of products called 'Collibri for Education'. The company states that 5 percent of the price of Collibri food and 3 percent of non-food products (not including value added tax) go to schooling projects run by non-governmental organisations.

But Brian Bowler, the Malawian ambassador to the European Union, said that Colruyt is "hoodwinking the public."

Bowler said that he has repeatedly asked for appointments with Jef Colruyt, the company's chairman, and for data proving that it is paying out all the donations it promised to make. Colruyt refused to give him those details or to arrange that he can see its chairman, he added.

"This is a scandal," he told IPS. "I don't know if it's illegal but I do know it's immoral. They should be able to give information about what they are doing with this brand but they cannot furnish us with that."

Bowler described as "very cunning" the phrasing used in the packaging for Collibri sugar, which carries the brand name Chikwawa and depicts a smiling man carrying cane.

"It more or less suggests that 5 percent from a particular sale will go to the country of origin," he said, though acknowledging that the commitment is not explicit.

The packaging also states that the cultivation and production of sugarcane plays an essential role in the Malawian economy. Among the other products bearing the Collibri logo of a bird are orange juice from Costa Rica and honey from Mexico.

Although Collibri does not carry a 'fair trade' logo or use the words 'fair trade' on its packaging, Bowler alleged that Colruyt is trying to exploit the growing consumer interest in Europe in buying goods produced in a socially responsible way. "This kind of thing could discredit fair trade," said Bowler.

Spokespersons for Colruyt, which recently reported that its revenues for the 2006-07 financial year exceeded 5 billion euros (6.7 billion dollars), did not return numerous calls from IPS.

However, a website promoting Collibri says that a "definite amount" from the sale of each product concerned goes to schooling projects in poor countries.

The website says that almost 152,000 euro (205,000 dollars) from Collibri sales was donated to education products between October 2005 and October 2006. The projects said to have benefited were in Tanzania, Indonesia, Benin, South Africa and Colombia.

No projects in Malawi are listed among the beneficiaries. However, Colruyt is known to have made arrangements for giving a sum of 15,000 euros (20,000 dollars) to Likulezi, an AIDS project in Malawi.

This project was suggested as one worthy of support by Trócaire, an Irish aid agency which has experience of working in Malawi. Seán Farrell, a fundraising coordinator with Trócaire, said that he had never heard of Colruyt before the question of a donation arose and that he had simply recommended Likulezi after being contacted by Broederlijk Delen, the Belgian Catholic aid agency.

The website says, too, that Colruyt endeavours to make sure that Collibri goods have been produced in a way that respects the rights of workers, ensures that money is paid up front to growers, and limits the impact on the environment.

Such principles are similar to those adopted by the international fair trade movement.

Anja Osterhaus from the organisation Fair Trade Advocacy said she was concerned that some companies could be "trying to use the interest of consumers in ethical purchasing" for their own commercial gain.

The proliferation of products on supermarket shelves that claim to adhere to high social or ecological standards is sowing confusion, she noted.

"Fair trade is about ensuring fair conditions of production," she told IPS. "It's not aid. But for consumers it is not easy to draw that distinction."

A report released earlier this year by an international development committee in the British parliament noted that there is an increasing number of 'ethical' initiatives being undertaken by both companies and non-governmental bodies, only some of which are independently verified.

In the Netherlands, for example, the Utz brand commands 25-30 percent of the coffee market. Although the company does not pay growers premium prices, it purports to have comparable aims to the fair trade movement.

Starbucks, meanwhile, has developed an in-house 'ethical sourcing' scheme known as CAFE (coffee and farmer equity). The scheme does not involve the paying of guaranteed prices or a social premium but Starbucks has boasted of paying above the world market price for coffee.

The largest banana companies have also begun carrying Rainforest Alliance labels in recent years in a bid to convince consumers that the fruit has been grown in an environmentally sustainable manner.

The British parliament report was favourable towards a call made by the European Parliament last year that an EU-wide regulation be introduced guaranteeing that consumers can have easily comprehensible information about 'ethical' products.

"The rise in ethical labels demonstrates that both retailers and consumers are interested in ethical sourcing," said the report. "It is important that fair trade organisations do not assume they have a monopoly on this, although fair trade can be said to represent a gold standard in terms of trading relations with producers. With many different schemes pursuing different objectives, it is vital that consumers are given the correct information in order to make informed choices." (END/2007)