Greenpeace Aotearoa says the latest exposé of Fonterra’s dishonest marketing strategies indicates that the co-operative’s license to pollute is coming to an end.
Greenpeace spokesperson Sinéad Deighton-O’Flynn says, “Fonterra’s dishonest claim that its milk is produced with regenerative farming is incompatible with the fact that they are the country’s biggest climate and freshwater polluter, and that the NZ dairy industry is the world’s biggest importer of rainforest destroying palm kernel.”
“Fonterra claiming that its polluting practices are regenerative because its cows are pasture-based is like Shell claiming its oil is organic because it comes out of the ground. It’s completely farcical,” says Deighton-O’Flynn.
“It’s time for Fonterra to take real action to cut their climate pollution. That means phasing out synthetic nitrogen fertiliser, ending the use of rainforest-destroying palm kernel, and supporting farmers to transition to ecological, organic farming practices.”
Fonterra’s greenwash tactics have also already been called out internationally by Amsterdam-based Changing Markets Foundation in their recent report The New Merchants of Doubt. The report outlines how the Big Meat and Dairy industries use the same denial and delay tactics as the oil and tobacco industries before them, to avoid responsibility for their major role in driving the climate crisis.