Reminder that as much as I am not a Nestlé fan, he never said that.
He said :
“Water is, of course, the most important raw material we have today in the world. It’s a question of whether we should privatize the normal water supply for the population. And there are two different opinions on the matter. The one opinion, which I think is extreme, is represented by the NGOs, who bang on about declaring water a public right. That means that as a human being you should have a right to water. That’s an extreme solution. The other view says that water is a foodstuff like any other, and like any other foodstuff it should have a market value. Personally, I believe it’s better to give a foodstuff a value so that we’re all aware it has its price, and then that one should take specific measures for the part of the population that has no access to this water, and there are many different possibilities there.”
Also, the whole "raahaahaha Nestlé is evil" was propulsed by Coca-Cola and Pepsico because they hated that a non-US company had rights on water in the US. (Water that they wanted to sell in the first place.) Nestlé is no more evil than any food company that is bigger than your local ethnic market. They just suck like every company.
Don't buy the propaganda and think that you are better from buying that brand rather than that one.
Just say "fuck all of them".
That's every large chocolate company though. Nestle just said the quiet part out loud. Even the ones that promise to use "ethical chocolate" are either unverifiable in their claims to begin with and/or have been exposed to be outright lying.
Yeah, or well, in theory their formula works, but given the realities of developing countries they knew they were killing babies when they introduced it there.
I try to stay away from buying nestle stuff, but it's nearly impossible... they have their mitts in everything, even cat food. (Purina) They have over 2000 brands ffs. https://www.nestle.com/brands
If you think it’s hard in developed countries(im trying not to make an assumption about where you live but assume it’s considered a developed country) you should see the issue in other countries. Maggi is one of the most popular brands in a lot of South Easy Asia; you see their sauces in most restaurants and the instant noodles are considered the best.
And the whole Japanese Kit Kat thing. I’ve seen store in SEA that have tons of different Kit Kats forms Japan because they have tons of flavours. Obviously this is also popular.
Nestle has dug themselves an entrenched position in SEA and will not give it up.
I'm in Canada, and while there are some options they're usually more expensive or harder to find. I live nearly 50 km (30 miles) from the nearest city and the few local stores here have extremely limited selections which means I have to drive 100km (60 miles) round trip just to avoid giving nestle any of my money.
Usually it means a once a month road trip to stock up on stuff, but we still have to break down and bite the bullet every now and then when we run out unexpectedly.
There are a few inaccuracies and simplifications here. Lactalis is independent from Nestlé, though they have a co-entreprise for dairy. For l'Oréal, it's a bit disingenuous to link both here because massive companies like that have a lot of mutual participations. And KitKat is manufactured by Hershey's in the US I think.
That being said, Lactalis is equally shitty so you can avoid it anyway. And the same goes for l'Oréal. I don't know about Hershey's but I could bet.
I learned about this at university. Wasn't sure I'd find mention of it online but it's out there. One of the many examples of corporations extra psychotic behavior in the Global South. IIRC they were keen on getting mothers feeding their babies formula particularly so their breast milk dried up and then they would have no alternative, becoming dependent and stuck in a financial bind.