Sad news from my home continent. Hemingway's feted Mt Kilimjaro is getting buck-naked. I remember hearing an Australian professor from Wharton speaking to our ELP associates class last year reference the Great Barrier Reef being GONE by 2050 - in his lifetime. It shocked me into paying attention. It has got the attention of hikers, even as first reports of it in 2002/3 including in National Geographic created something of an express to get people to the top and back. Certainly in South Africa it became much more popular even de rigeur amongst the Johannesburg professional set.
Maybe this can bring it home hard for people I come into contact with. At least the saddest news gives me an solid start to my presenation to young MIT & Babson College students this Tuesday "A Spring Symposium: “Make your Career (& Life) Make a Difference”. I am hoping I can deliver to the students the real life - secrest of my success - type look at the world inside, a bit of humour, and a way to open doors.
Some of my comments will rest on the current goings on at Nestle'. After some scathing comments on the merits of CSR, Thursday sees the vote coming with the pressure from the Swiss Pension Funds grouping aiming to prevent the CEO from taking the vacating chair. Ethos - Swiss Investment Foundation for Sustainable Development and five other shareholders (collectively Ethos Group) have submitted this proposal to amend Nestle's articles of association to include a clause that "The Chairman cannot simultaneously hold an exclusive function within the executive management." Two groups, including a Swiss investment fund, Ethos, and ACTARES, a group of smaller shareholders campaigning for ethical business practices, have announced that they intend to submit motions to ensure the two posts remain separate. ISS has backed the pension funds ISS Supports Nestle Shareholder Proposal to Split Chairman and CEO. Ethos chief Dominique Biedermann said he was expecting about 20 percent of votes in support of the move. Two other groups representing institutional investors reportedly were lining up behind the call.
In another demonstration of the impact of Corporate Governance and the ongoing small size of SRI pension funds, the Nestle' affair has garnered headlines, but may likely not impact the vote. It does keep the glare on. Nestle' has not been doing everything right, including (according to SRI Media) suffering two boycotts recently over matters such as selling of baby milk formula to the developing world, where hygiene standards made breast milk safer, and its alleged involvement in Coco slavery where tenant farmers are deliberately kept in a state of constant debt.
Together with the top-to-bottom attention on Nestle' and the way it does business may yet have some effect. I wonder what other delgates to the 2005 Ceres Conference, "Building Equity, Reducing Risk" tomorrow will have to say. I'll have thoughts from the conference Thursday evening.
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