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The Very Best...

© Amy Condra-Peters

Nestlé, the world's largest baby food company and the maker of Carnation Baby Formula, has released a new parenting publication titled The Very Best: For Your New Baby and Growing Family. Widely marketed through television commercials, this free magazine offers formula coupons nestled among recipes and baby care-tips. While this magazine does provide some useful advice, it is difficult to believe that Nestlé is truly looking out for any baby's best interests.

Nestlé's magazine recounts the company's long history in the baby food industry: "It all began in 1867, when a young Swiss pharmacist named Henri Nestlé was asked to look in on a neighbor's child who couldn't breastfeed. Henri saved the baby's life by creating a special mixture of what would later be recognized as the world's first infant food. We've been in the business of caring for babies ever since."

I shudder for the babies under Nestlé's care - what is omitted from this warm and fuzzy mission statement is the fact that Nestlé has traditionally shown a blatant disregard for infants' lives by repeatedly violating the World Health Organization's International Code of Marketing of Breast-Milk Substitutes. This Code has been worldwide policy since 1994, when President Clinton joined with other nations to place public health before profit. The Code is designed to stop unethical marketing practices targeted at families in developing nations - practices such as the following:

1. Labeling formula in languages that native people could not understand

2. Hiring medical representatives to encourage impoverished families to purchase a product that they don't need and cannot afford.

While the choice to feed a baby formula may seem relatively benign from our 20th-century Western perspective, this decision often entails dire consequences for babies in underdeveloped nations. The United Nations Children's fund states that in areas with unsafe water, a bottle-fed baby is 25 times more likely than a breastfed baby to die from diarrhea.

We're happy to hear that Nestlé is interested in supporting new mothers; we just wish that they would demonstrate their concern by following regulations that are truly designed to provide all babies with "the very best."

To learn more about an organization that truly advocates for our babies, visit INFACT.

Need breastfeeding guidance and support? Visit La Leche League.

The copyright of the article The Very Best... in Mothering is owned by Amy Condra-Peters. Permission to republish The Very Best... in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.