Home | Over ons | Nieuws | Campagnemateriaal | Shopping | Giften | Vrijwilligers | Links | Contacteer ons

Te boycotten bedrijven > Altria Group (Philip Morris, Kraft Foods)

Deze pagina is niet in het Nederlands beschickbaar.
Help mee de site actualiseren. Bied je aan als vrijwillig vertaler!

What's wrong with Altria?

Altria Group is the new name for tobacco and food giants Phillip Morris and Kraft Foods. Wherever they work, Altria has demonstrated irresponsibility and lack of concern for public health, human rights and the global environment.

Chairman and CEO: Louis C. Camilleri
Postal address: Altria Group, Inc., Communications, 120 Park Avenue, 16th fl., New York, NY 10017, USA
Phone number: +1-917-663-4000
Fax number: +1-917-663-5544
Website: www.altria.com
Email address: contact them

Short history: Philip Morris acquired General Foods in 1985 and Kraft Foods in 1988. In April 2002, Philip Morris changed it's name into Altria, a corporate umbrella, this to have a distance from the controversy surrounding the tobacco industry.

Activities: Philip Morris produces seven of the top 20 best-selling international brands, including Marlboro, the world's top-selling cigarette brand, Lark, Chesterfield and L&M. Kraft Foods is the second-largest branded food and beverage company worldwide. It sells its products in more than 150 countries.

Bush donor: Altria is one of the top ten sponsors of Bush. From 2000 till now, Altria has given US$6,990,000 to the Republican Party.

Lobbying against the FCTC: Philip Morris uses every resource at its disposal to block or weaken the World Health Organization's proposed Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), who establishes an important precendent for international regulation of corporations that profit at the expense of our health, our environment and human rights such as the agribusiness, oil, pharmaceuticals, water and weapons industries.

Killing people: In high-income countries, 15.000 youth become addicted to tobacco every day, 84.000 in middle- and low-income countries. Tobacco is responsible for one death every ten seconds worldwide, killing nearly 5 million people every year. If current trends continue, tobacco will become the world's leading cause of death by 2030.

Aggravating world famine: The fertile land appropriated for the production of tobacco is enough to feed millions of people worldwide.

Chemical pollution: Tobacco growing can deplete the soil in 2 years and requires the heavy use of dangerous chemicals which contaminate our environment and put tobacco farmers at risk.

Exploiting child workers: The use of child labourers in tobacco production is widespread in major tobacco producing countries. Children are directly exposed to a cocktail of highly toxic agro-chemicals.

Deforestation: Tobacco is a major cause of deforestation. Worldwide, between 1.2 and 5.5 million ha. of forest - one in eight trees cut down in the world - is due to tobacco growing or curing. Clearing forests for tobacco production causes soil erosion and related ecological damage. Curing, - or drying out - by burning wood the harvested tobacco leaves from their natural green to the brownish colour seen in cigarettes, uses huge amounts of wood fuel, especially timber - trees which could be used for cooking and heating by local peoples.

Last update: June 2005