#Unilever Plc will keep making #Cornetto and Carte D’Or in #Russia even after shedding its global ice cream unit.
Companies like Unilever condemned Russia’s invasion but finding buyers for the assets of “unfriendly countries” is challenging and incurs a large exit tax. #Mondelez, #Nestle and #Procter & #Gamble are among the Western multinationals that have maintained large operations in Russia.
Der britische Konsumgüter-Konzern Unilever spaltet sein Eiscreme-Geschäft ab. Die Marken Langnese, Magnum und Ben & Jerry's sollen in eine eigenständige Firma ausgelagert werden.
How many Russian missiles & drones launched against Ukrainian civilians in residential buildings, hospitals, kindergartens and supermarkets were funded by #Unilever $50M taxes paid in #russia in 2022?🤔
Unilever, one of the world leaders in the food and household chemicals market, has decided to continue its business in Russia - the report for the 3rd quarter of this year does not contain any action plan to exit Russia. #Boycott#Unilever @liveukraine_media
I’ve taken some individual actions which can only make a difference collectively, progressing in difficulty:
Started off switching back to cash in all the simple scenarios (paying grocers, restaurants, fuel). Some credit cards give the biggest rebates in those categories precisely because the credit card adds no benefit to those types purchases.
When dining with a group of people, insist on getting your own separate bill. Otherwise if just one person insists on using a credit card, the whole bill would be paid by that card & the resto would have no metric showing that they were fed in part by a cash payment. Restaurants have been baited¹ by Visa so it’s important to offset that tactic by making sure restaurants get cash payments. ① Visa offered a $10k bonus to restaurants who commit to refusing cash for 1 year. That’s an easy decision for an owner to make if all their payments are by card anyway.
If a business is needlessly cashless (e.g. they are a brick and mortar establishment), boycott them.
Buying other goods (not food, fuel, or services) with credit card sometimes have extended warranty benefits. I eventually decided to give those up & pay cash. But then I found that cash is more widely accepted at street markets and prices are often quite low (esp. for 2nd hand). So shopping at street markets becomes more interesting.
Boycott Amazon just because they are probably the most harmful retailer anyway. Once you take that step, it’s easier to nix online shopping entirely because there’s not much competition left anyway. Buy local.
File complaints and put of a fight whenever the gov. forces you to pay electronically to a government office. You can boycott the private sector but you can’t quit taxation, so it’s important to make the biggest stink when a public service requires non-cash payments. If you are an American outside the US, non-US banks usually discriminate based on nationality, in which case you can call out a human rights breach under UDHR article 1.
Pay utility bills in cash. Yeah it’s a hassle but in some cases you can reduce billing frequency to quarterly & they’re happy to accept large advance payments as well.
When donating money to a non-profit, don’t let them dictate terms. They have no leverage. Get their mailing address to mail small cash donations, or find out which conferences they will appear at and pay them in person.
In the US you can pay taxes in cash. Not sure about other countries.
If you run a business of course consider making it cash only. If you’re in a country like Belgium where accepting electronic payment is an obligation, offer a 10% discount to cash payers.
A message for #Unilever from the ruins of destroyed apartment buildings in Borodianka, #Ukraine. The UK company keeps paying hundreds of millions of dollars and fascilitating conscription for Russia's war against #Ukraine. It owns 400 brands worldwide including Axe, Ben & Jerry's, Best Foods, Dove, Dusch Das, Hellmann's, Knorr, Lipton, Magnum, Q-Tips, Rexona, Vaseline, and Wall's (aka Algida, Eskimo, Good Humor, HB, Ingman, Langnese, Napoca,…).
A little digging shows that the #oligarchs continue to live a life of luxury in London, buying holiday homes in Thailand and freely travelling between the two in their private jets.
Meanwhile Russia continues to do big exports to the West (gemstones & precious metals) and big Western companies still operate in Russia (#Unilever, #Nestlé, #Auchun, #leroymerlin, etc.)
“If the risk of becoming complicit in russia’s crimes against humanity hasn’t swayed #Unilever their consumers need to be the ones to show them that staying in russia will hurt them much more than leaving ever would” - B4Ukraine
The National Agency for Corruption Prevention of Ukraine adds the owner of #Lipton, #Rexona and #Dove to the list of international sponsors of war
For example, some major food companies promised to offer only basic supplies in Russia. But luxury foods from big brands such as ice cream, beer and chocolate are still being sold in Russia.
Cashless shops operating i̶l̶l̶e̶g̶a̶l̶l̶y̶ (legally) in Netherlands a̶n̶d̶ (but not) Belgium; corporate disobedience
cross-posted from: slrpnk.net/post/1624944...