Canada Is Not A Banana Republic

In 2007 Chiquita Brands was fined $25 million for paying protection money to Columbian terrorists. A case could be made that the company was the victim of extortion but the DOJ didn't buy it. Trying to buy peace may have been illegal but it is understandable. Why would a corporation subject itself to a conflict it could avoid? That question has been raised again. Why would Chiquita buckle to lame, left leaning, Forest Ethics, an new environmental group that seeks "market solutions" to environmental problems? The "market solutions" Forest Ethics uses would fall into the general category of greenmail. Like blackmail it's extortion but in this case the ends justify the means as fuzzy polar bears might go the way of the passenger pigeon because of the global warming that axiomatically would result from extracting oil from the tar sands of western Canada. Of course under this dire scenario, Canada could shift from energy extraction and plant its own banana trees.

What Chiquita failed to grasp was the simple fact that Canada is no banana republic. Now the "market solution" Chiquita bought into looks more like a Faustian bargain and there is the devil to pay. The new "market solution" boils down to the fact that north of International Falls there is no market for Chiquita bananas or Fresh Express salads. It would have been safer for Chiquita to have tee peed the Corleone family's lawn. From ethical oil.org's web site comes theses accounts of loyal Canadians expressing their market solutions to Chiquita's misstep.

One was from a woman in Alberta who wrote: “My best story is going to the grocery store just now, spoke with the produce manager who agreed with me and asked me to write their head office as he does not have a say in where they order from.“Then I stood by the Fresh Express display and told everyone buying the product that it was a Chiquita product. Not one person bought any, then as I shopped if I saw (them) in someone’s cart I explained and they all refused to buy it.”Fresh Express is a subsidiary of Chiquita Band.

Another story was posted by an Ontario resident: “Delighted to advise that Zehr’s supermarkets (a Loblaws-owned chain in central and SW Ontario) in Barrie, ON, has ZERO Chiquita bananas and ZERO Fresh Express salads on sale! … ONLY DelMonte bananas and Dole bagged salads. Their produce manager did not know WHY, but said ‘that’s all they shipped me so that’s all I’ve got’ … I told him about the boycott, and he replied ‘That explains it then!’”Finally, a post from a woman in Vancouver: “My husband manages the produce dept. of a busy local grocery store in our city. He has spoken to the store manager about Chiquita and they are looking to promote alternative companies like Dole and DelMonte. The store already offers quite a salad selection, so losing “Fresh Express” salads is not a hardship. He is explaining the situation to customers and they are supporting him by not buying Chiquita. Wonder how they are enjoying the pushback?”“There’s some incredibly awesome stories that people are posting,” said Marshall. “People are really taking it into their own hands, which is fantastic. Consumers have a lot of say and I think Chiquita is really underestimating how pissed off Canadians are about this, especially Albertans.

O Canada!