The past 10 days have seen a growing chorus of protests aimed at
KFC’s destructive packaging while the company has remained totally
silent over what action it will take to cut the infamous Asia Pulp and
Paper (APP) out of its supply chain.
In India, Greenpeace
activists dressed as orangutans held banners emblazoned with “KFC: No
Good For Rainforests” outside a KFC store in downtown Delhi. A follow-up
in Kolkata swiftly followed, with more orangutans lining up to demand
that KFC stop turning rainforests into trash to make cheap packaging.
Protests took a forensics turn in the Netherlands, with no less than 29 KFC locations turning into “Forest Crime Scenes” depicting the victim of KFC’s destructive packaging sourcing: the critically endangered Sumatran tiger. There are now fewer than 400 Sumatran tigers in the wild, but KFC supplier APP is still pulping the remaining rainforest habitat of these magnificent creatures to fuel its mills. This even includes APP’s own “tiger sanctuary”.
Meanwhile
in Spain, Greenpeace took to the streets to highlight KFC’s direct
links to the destruction of Indonesian rainforests. Passers-by in Madrid
were invited to reveal the truth behind KFC’s packaging – exotic birds
and tigers at the mercy of one mean looking Colonel Sanders. Scarcely
able to believe that KFC could be so irresponsible, crowds lined up to
throw balls at cardboard cutouts of the Colonel.
Next up, Colonel
Sanders got a taste of his own medicine when he showed up in Toronto’s
Kensington Market, chainsaw in hand. Over and over again, a shivering
“Colonel” was mercilessly dunked by pedestrians in his own iconic
bucket. Of course, the original Colonel Sanders would be horrified to
learn that KFC buckets and other packaging are being made from
rainforests and habitat for critically endangered tigers.
And
in Bangkok, more than 30 Greenpeace activists dressed as homeless
Sumatran tigers gathered in front of KFC to illustrate the impacts of
APP rainforest destruction and to urge the company to stop using cheap
packaging from the tiger’s rainforest home. Even some of Bangkok’s monks
were moved to join Greenpeace’s call to action!
Now
that the secret is out of the bucket, Greenpeace is calling on KFC and
its parent company Yum! to immediately drop APP as a supplier and get
serious about eliminating deforestation from its supply chains. A host
of major companies across the world (Xerox, Mattel, Kraft, to name but a
few) have already taken action to remove APP from their supply chains
as a result of its links to illegal
logging, destruction of Sumatran tiger habitat and unrepentant draining
of carbon-rich peatlands vital to prevent climate change.
So far, as KFC’s bosses watched in stunned silence, Greenpeace’s
campaign continues to grow before their eyes, with more and more
countries taking up the call. KFC needs to act now by ditching APP and
introducing new policies to ensure deforestation is cut out of its
supply chain. Otherwise it promises to be a long, hot summer for KFC. As
they say, “out of the frying pan, into the fire…”
For the
rainforests, endangered species and the climate, please join the revolt
against KFC’s destructive packaging today. Rainforests aren’t trash: www.kfc-secretrecipe.com
