FAT CATS or FUNDAMENTAL CHANGES

Have you had your invitation yet? No? Surely there must be some mistake. I was reliably informed that two thousand hand picked “global leaders” would be invited to attend the World Economic Forum, at Davros in Switzerland. Ah, now I see where the problem lies. These are not “the great and the good” we normally associate with global leaders. Indeed they are not even the geographically diverse. These global leaders are predominantly drawn from the ranks of the rich and powerful in the First World. They consists primarily of First World politicians and CEOs of “International” companies whose head offices are generally to be found in First World countries. A fairly select club consisting of those who make lots of money and those who make the laws. Cosy!

So what do such people gain out of this sort of meeting. Well, for the multinational companies it is an ideal forum in which to lobby senior politicians. Then of course there are the “Governors’ Groups”, secretive meetings in which CEOs can get together and discuss topics of mutual interest. Of course, ordinary members of the public are not privy to what goes on at such meetings, but I can pretty much guarantee that topics like the furtherance of equality in world trade or ways to promote environmental sustainability in global trade do not come up much.

Let’s see what organisations are attending this forum. Well there is Boots owner of the Farley Baby Milk company, sited in 1991 as one of the worst violaters of the WHO Code on the marketting of baby milk substitutes, The British American Tobacco Co who chose to cover up the negative health implications of tobacco smoking. BP Amoco featured in Greenpeace’s “Filthy Fifty” and Friends of the Earth’s “Secret Polluters” listings and other multinationals with an equally tarnished reputation: Exxon Mobil Corporation, Monsanto,Proctor and Gambleand SmithKline Beecham to name but a few. For further details about the sort of multinationals attending the forum check out this Geocities site. (Did I mention that those attending were not “the great and the good”?)

So where do you go to hear the other side of the story. Well, fortunately, during this week, the World Social Forum is also being held in Puerto Alegre. This forum looks at the alternatives to “Business As Usual”. For further information on the World Economic Forum at Davros, from an environmental perspective, check out the The Public Eye on Davros co-ordinated by the Berne Declaration, a Swiss NGO and see what Friends of the Earth International are doing at both of these meetings.

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