Chiquita Brands International

"Chiquita" redirects here. For other uses, see Chiquita (disambiguation).

Chiquita Brands International

Type	Public (NYSE: CQB)
Industry	Agriculture
Founded	1871
Headquarters	Downtown Cincinnati Cincinnati, Ohio
Key people	Fernando Aguirre, President & CEO
Products	Food, Bananas
Revenue	$4.663 Billion USD (2007)
Net income	-$49 Million USD (2007)
Employees	10,000 (2007 est)
Website	www.chiquita.com

Chiquita Center in Downtown Cincinnati

Chiquita Brands International Inc. (NYSE: CQB) is an American producer and distributor of bananas and other produce, under a variety of subsidiary brand names, collectively known as Chiquita. Other brands include Fresh Express salads, which it purchased from Performance Food Group in 2005. Its headquarters is located in Downtown Cincinnati, Ohio.^[1] Chiquita is the successor to the United Fruit Company and is the leading distributor of bananas in the United States. The company also owns a German produce distribution company, Atlanta AG, which it acquired in 2003. Chiquita was formerly controlled by Cincinnati businessman Carl H. Lindner, Jr., whose majority ownership of the company ended as a result of Chiquita Brands International exiting a prepackaged Chapter 11 bankruptcy on March 19, 2002. The enterprise changed its name to Chiquita Brands and operates with that name to this day.

Chiquita Banana

The trademark logo mascot, Chiquita Banana, was created by Dik Browne, who is best known for his Hägar the Horrible comic strip. 1940s vocalist Patti Clayton was the original 1944 voice of Chiquita Banana, followed by Elsa Miranda, June Valli and Monica Lewis. Advertisements featured the banana character wearing a fruit hat. The banana was changed into a woman in 1987.

History

Chiquita Brands International Inc. is the final name in a long list of companies whose ultimate origin was the United Fruit Company, formed in 1899 by the merging of the Boston Fruit Company and various fruit exporting concerns controlled by Minor C. Keith. In 1970 it became the United Brands Company when it was purchased by Eli Black. He outbid two other conglomerates, Zapata Corporation and Textron, for a controlling interest in the company.^[2] In fact, that is a condensed version of what has actually happened to United Fruit Co., famed in the U.S. for Chiquita bananas, but known to generations of Latin Americans as "el Pulpo" (the Octopus). In 1985 the company became Chiquita Brands International.

The Cincinnati Enquirer controversy

Chiquita Scandinavia, a former Chiquita Brands International ship.^[3]

On May 3, 1998, The Cincinnati Enquirer published an eighteen-page section,^[4] "Chiquita Secrets Revealed" by Enquirer investigative reporters Michael Gallagher and Cameron McWhirter. The articles accused the company of mistreating the workers on its Central American plantations, polluting the environment, allowing cocaine to be brought to the United States on its ships, bribing foreign officials, evading foreign nations' laws on land ownership, forcibly preventing its workers from unionizing, and a host of other misdeeds.

Chiquita denied all the allegations, and sued after it was revealed that Gallagher had repeatedly hacked into Chiquita's voice-mail system. (No evidence ever indicated that McWhirter was aware of Gallagher's crime or a participant.) A special prosecutor was appointed to investigate, because the elected prosecutor at the time had ties to Carl Lindner, Jr. On June 28, 1998, the Enquirer retracted the entire series of stories, published a front-page apology, and paid the company a multi-million-dollar settlement. The Columbia Journalism Review reported both $14 million and $50 million for the amount.^{[citation needed]} Chiquita's Annual Report mentions 'a cash settlement in excess of $10 million'. One of the reporters, Gallagher, was fired and prosecuted and the paper's editor, Lawrence K. Beaupre, was transferred to the Gannett's headquarters amid allegations that he ignored the paper's usual procedures on fact-checking in order to win a Pulitzer Prize.

Chiquita and Social Action Groups

In 1998, a coalition of social activist groups, led by EUROBAN (European Banana Action Network), itself a coalition of labor and environmental groups, chose to target the banana industry in general and Chiquita in particular to create a new climate of corporate social responsibility. Their strategy was to encourage small farming of bananas rather than large scale monoculture, and to push for subsidies and other government relief to level the field for small producers. The Fair Trade movement, which sought to influence consumers to purchase the products of smallholders also joined in the action. As a result of this pressure, changes in corporate management, and new patterns of global competition, according to J. Gary Taylor and Patricia Scharlin, Chiquita partnered with the Rainforest Alliance, an environmental group dedicated to preserving the rainforest, and made major reforms in the way they plant and protect their bananas, especially in the use of pesticides, but also to some extent in other aspects of the corporate culture.^[5]

Payments to paramilitary groups

See also: Colombian armed conflict and Doe v. Chiquita Brands International

On March 14, 2007, Chiquita Brands was fined $25 million as part of a settlement with the United States Justice Department for having ties to Colombian paramilitary groups. According to court documents, between 1997 and 2004, officers of a Chiquita subsidiary paid approximately $1.7 million to the right-wing United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC), in exchange for local, employee protection in Colombia's volatile banana harvesting zone. Similar payments were also made to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), as well as the National Liberation Army (ELN) from 1989 to 1997, both left-wing organizations.^[6][7] All three of these groups are on the U.S. State Department's list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations.

Chiquita currently faces serious charges in a lawsuit issued in June 2007. According to the attorney of 173 family members of victims of the AUC militia this could be the biggest terrorist case in history and may put Chiquita out of business. Terry Collingsworth, a lawyer with International Rights Advocates who is involved with the multi-million dollar litigation, said: "This is a landmark case, maybe the biggest terrorism case in history. In terms of casualties, it's the size of three World Trade Center attacks."^[8]

Despite reaching a deal with US prosecutors, Chiquita Brands International still may have to face criminal charges in Colombia, which could even include the extradition of some of its current and former board members. Specifically, on December 7, 2007, "the 29th Specialized District Attorney's Office in Medellín called the board members of Chiquita […] to make statements concerning charges for conspiracy to commit an aggravated crime and financing illegal armed groups. The court order mentions Robert Fisher, Steven G. Wars, Carl H. Linder, Durk Jaguer, Jeffrey Benjamin, Morten Amtzen, Roderick Hills (former committee director of Chiquita), Cyrus F. Freidheim (former general director and most recently president and CEO of a large media group), and Robert Olson, former legal counsel. The nine of them, according to the initial data obtained by the Attorney General's Office, knew of the illegal operation through which 1.7 million dollars were transferred to the AUC, a charge to which Chiquita has already admitted and for which the US justice system fined it 25 million dollars."^[9]

Alleged continuing workers' rights violations

In May 2007, the French non-governmental organization (NGO) "Peuples Solidaires" publicly accused the Compañia Bananera Atlántica Limitada (COBAL), a Chiquita subsidiary, of knowingly violating what the NGO describes as "its workers' basic rights" and endangering their families' health and their own. Allegedly, the banana firm has carelessly exposed labourers at the Coyol plantation in Costa Rica to highly toxic pesticides on multiple occasions. Additionally, the human rights group accuses the company of using a private militia to intimidate workers. Finally, Peuples Solidaires claims that Chiquita, despite a regional agreement between the company and local unions requiring prompt investigation of grievances, has ignored certain union complaints for more than a year.^[10]

Human rights violations in literature

Several authors have denounced human rights violations committed by the United Fruit Company (now Chiquita). The most important ones are One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez, Green Pope by Miguel Ángel Asturias, La Casa Grande by Alvaro Cepeda Samudio, and the poem United Fruit Company by Pablo Neruda, included in his epic work Canto General. Garcia Marquez, Asturias, and Neruda were awarded with the Nobel Prize in Literature. According to some studies, the work Nostromo by Joseph Conrad was also inspired by the United Fruit Company. Another author in Costa Rica, Carlos Luis Fallas, wrote Mamita Yunai (Yunai is a deformation of the word "united").

The movie "Life & Debt" describes a modern instance of the company, or it's sub-managers, killing strikers.

See also

	Cincinnati portal
	Ohio portal
	Companies portal
	Food portal

• Grand Nain
• Paramilitarism in Colombia
• Union of Banana Exporting Countries
• United Fruit Company

References

1. ^ "Contact Us." Chiquita Brands International. Retrieved on March 31, 2010.
2. ^ "Prettying Up Chiquita". Time. September 3, 1973. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,910767-1,00.html. 
3. ^ Corporate-ir.net
4. ^ Mindfully.org
5. ^ J. Gary Taylor and Patricia Scharlin, Smart Alliance: How Global Capitalism and Environmental Activists Transformed a Tarnished Brand (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2004).
6. ^ Michael Evans, 'Para-politics' Goes Bananas, The Nation, 4 April 2007
7. ^ Matt Apuzzo, Associated Press writer, Chiquita to Pay $25M Fine in Terror Case, ABC News, 15 March 2007
8. ^ Chiquita faces Colombia lawsuit, Al Jazeera, June 7, 2007
9. ^ Colectivodeabogados.org, Extraditions Cut Short Jose Alvear Restrepo Lawyers' Collective, May 25, 2008
10. ^ peuples-solidaires.org, "Chiquita Indegestible Bananas", Peuples Solidaires, From May 7 to June 30, 2007

Further reading

• Bender, Nicholas (May/June 2001). "Banana report". Columbia Journalism Review. 
• Frantz, Douglas (July 17, 1998). "After apology, issues raised in Chiquita articles remain". The New York Times: pp. A1, A14. 
• Frantz, Douglas (July 17, 1998). "Mysteries behind story's publication". The New York Times: p. A14. 
• Stein, Nicholas (September/October 1998). "Banana peel". Columbia Journalism Review. 
• Mike Gallagher & Cameron McWhirter, "Chiquita Secrets Revealed," Cincinnati Enquirer, May 3, 1998.
• "The Business and Human Rights Management Report—Chiquita Brands International", Ethical Corporate Magazine, Nov. 2004.
• Bucheli, Marcelo (2005). Bananas and Business: The United Fruit Company in Colombia: 1899-2000. New York: New York University Press. ISBN 9780814799345. http://books.google.com/?id=kUfnWhn6H7gC. 
• Bucheli, Marcelo (July 2008). "Multinational Corporations, Totalitarian Regimes, and Economic Nationalism: United Fruit Company in Central America, 1899-1975". Business History 50 (4): 433–454. doi:10.1080/00076790802106315. 
• Bucheli, Marcelo (November 2005). "Banana Wars Maneuvers". Harvard Business Review 83 (11): 22–24. http://harvardbusinessonline.hbsp.harvard.edu/b02/en/common/item_detail.jhtml?id=F0511E&referral=2340. 
• Bucheli, Marcelo; Geoffrey Jones (2005). "The Octopus and the Generals". Harvard Business School Case (9–805–146). http://harvardbusinessonline.hbsp.harvard.edu/b01/en/common/item_detail.jhtml?id=805146. 
• Bucheli, Marcelo. "The United Fruit Company in Latin America: Business Strategies in a Changing Environment". In Jones, Geoffrey; Wadhwani, R. Daniel. Entrepreneurship and Global Capitalism. 2. Cheltenham (UK): Edward Elgar. 2006. pp. 342–383. http://www.e-elgar.co.uk/Bookentry_contents.lasso?id=3844. 
• Bucheli, Marcelo (Summer 2004). "Enforcing Business Contracts in South America: The United Fruit Company and the Colombian Banana Planters in the Twentieth-Century". Business History Review (The Business History Review, Vol. 78, No. 2) 78 (2): 181–212. doi:10.2307/25096865. JSTOR 25096865. http://www.hbs.edu/bhr/archives/vol78/vol78-2004summer.html. 
• Bucheli, Marcelo; Read, Ian (2006). "Banana Boats and Baby Food: The Banana in U.S. History". In Topik, Steven; Marichal, Carlos; Frank, Zephyr. From Silver to Cocaine: Latin American Commodity Chains and the Building of the World Economy, 1500-2000. Durham: Duke University Press. ISBN 9780822337669. http://books.google.com/?id=mnvBYQqpJbQC&dq=from+silver+to+cocaine. 
• Bucheli, Marcelo (2003). "United Fruit Company in Latin America". In Moberg, Mark; Striffler, Steve. Banana Wars: Power, Production, and History in the Americas. Durham: Duke University Press. ISBN 9780822331964. http://books.google.com/?id=Fv2VH9LGQqoC&dq=banana+wars. 
• Bucheli, Marcelo (2006). "United Fruit Company". In Geisst, Charles. Encyclopedia of American Business History. London: Facts on File. 2005. ISBN 9780816043507. http://books.google.com/?id=KfuAGwAACAAJ&dq=charles+geisst+encyclopedia. 
• Bucheli, Marcelo. "United Fruit Company". In McCusker, John (^{[dead link]}). History of World Trade Since 1450. New York: Macmillan. 2004. http://books.google.com/?id=49T1AQAACAAJ&dq=john+mccusker. 
• Taylor, Gary; Patricia Sharlin (2004). Smart Alliance: How a Global Corporation and Environmental Activists Transformed a Tarnished Brand. New Haven: Yale University Press. 
• "The Importance of Corporate Responsibility", Economist Intelligence Unit, January 2005.
• "Chiquita Brands: A Turnaround That Is Here to Stay", Winslow Environmental News, January 2004.
• "The banana giant that found its gentle side", 'Financial Times, December 2002
• '"Chiquita Wins Raves for Outstanding Sustainability Reporting", Greenbiz.com, April 3, 2003

External links

• Chiquita Brands International official site
• Chiquita Bananas official site
• United Fruit Historical Society: This site contains a detailed chronology of the history of Chiquita, biographies of the company's main protagonists, and an extensive bibliography.
• CounterPunch, 17 July 2009, From Arbenz to Zelaya: Chiquita in Latin America with video report by Democracy Now!
• Chiquita Lauded for Human Rights Abuses by Dan Kovalik, CounterPunch, January 12, 2010
• Chiquita: Between Life and Law Al Jazeera, June 2009
• The Chiquita Papers at The National Security Archive