One of Denmark’s largest pension funds does not wish to invest in companies that violate human rights or harm the climate. At least not officially.
Nevertheless, Danwatch can now reveal that Sampension invests in 59 companies that the pension fund has officially blacklisted.
A review of the pension fund’s investments shows that Sampension invests members’ money in the companies through external funds. The companies are excluded due to involvement in coal, tar sands, controversial arms or human rights violations.
It is criticised by experts and organisations. One of them is Andreas Rasche, Professor of Sustainable Finance:
“The excluded companies should not be part of the portfolio. Otherwise, the organisation violates its own principles and, in the long term, members will lose confidence in Sampension,” says Andreas Rasche, Professor of Sustainable Finance at Copenhagen Business School.
The companies that Sampension has officially blacklisted but nevertheless invests in include the oil giants ConocoPhillips and Totalenergies.
There are also a number of companies involved in nuclear weapons, such as Aerojet Rocketdyne Holding, which produces nuclear missile systems for the US and UK militaries. This was revealed by Danwatch’s review of Sampension’s stock lists compared to the pension fund’s own exclusion lists.
THE FACTS
Here are the companies that Sampension invests in, even though they are also blacklisted. It has not been possible to obtain the amounts of the individual investments. “Reason for exclusion” is taken from Sampension’s own exclusion list.
The revelation comes at a time when Sampension is already struggling with a lack of confidence from its members. This is especially true in Pensionskassen for Arkitekter og Designere (PAD) (the Pension Fund for Architects and Designers), which has over 10,000 members and is now part of Sampension.
For quite some time, PAD’s members have criticised Sampension for unambitious climate goals and concealed investments.
PAD has recently held its election for the board, where the two most critical candidates received the most votes and were elected. According to PAD board member Mads Gudmand Høyer, the new board will take the information about Sampension’s investments in blacklisted companies very seriously.
“PAD has just been through an intense election campaign, and the newly elected board members campaigned for greater transparency, among other things. It’s a shame if Sampension doesn’t have better control of their exclusion lists. But it can be expected to receive full attention of a new board,” says Mads Gudmand Høyer, board member of PAD and construction consultant at Landsbyggefonden.
One of the reasons for the members’ distrust is that Sampension received the lowest ranking in WWF World Wildlife Fund’s latest report on the pension sector’s climate efforts. The reason was that Sampension was the only one of the 16 pension funds that refused to participate in the survey.
Based on Danwatch survey, WWF is concerned about Sampension’s work with climate change.
“As the sole Danish pension fund, Sampension does not wish to participate in the latest of WWF World Wildlife Fund Denmark’s regular reports on the progress of the green transition in the Danish pension industry,” says Bo Øksnebjerg, Secretary General of WWF Denmark, adding:
“I hope it is not because they are trying to hide irresponsible climate and nature unfriendly investments, like the ones Danwatch has now revealed in areas such as coal, tar sands and lack of green transition. I urge Sampension to immediately increase transparency on their investments and green profile. What we see now is not good enough.”
Sampension denies that the investments in the blacklisted companies are problematic and points out that they are the customers’ own responsibility.
The external funds that contain blacklisted companies are part of a product called Linkpension, where customers can choose for themselves to invest parts of their savings through a number of funds, Sampension explains.
“This is fundamentally different from Sampension managing funds for the customers. Here, customers manage their assets themselves and make their own choices,” says Jacob Ehlerth Jørgensen, Head of ESG at Sampension, and continues:
“We see it as a universe that is sought after by some customers, and it’s our job to make sure they have some choices.”
But surely you are the ones who have chosen the funds that the customers can choose to invest in. Isn’t that right?
“Yes, that’s correct.”
Together with the business media Finans, Danwatch has previously revealed similar issues in the pension fund Velliv, which also invests in companies on its own blacklist through external funds.
Like Velliv, Sampension points out that these are so-called index funds, where a pension fund cannot impose the exclusion of individual companies in the portfolio.
But if you are the one choosing the funds, it is surely also a choice on your part to offer some funds that contain companies that you have excluded yourself. Isn’t that a compromise against your own values and politics?
“When you have an index product that invests in the entire index universe, you will always encounter one or more companies that are on the exclusion list. It’s a problem that is difficult to resolve,” says Jacob Ehlerth Jørgensen.
Andreas Rasche disagrees.
“It’s difficult, but it’s not impossible. There are many funds, and also many funds that do not invest in companies involved in coal, tar sands, controversial arms and the like,” says the professor of sustainable finance.
In addition to fuelling the crisis of confidence by investing in blacklisted companies, Sampension should also be more transparent about its investments, according to criticism from several quarters.
About half an hour of a heated election debate has passed when Lene Dammand Lund turns up the intensity in the high-ceilinged room with its fashionable plank floors:
“At this point, I have to address the elephant in the room,” says the 59-year-old architect, who is rector of the Royal Danish Academy and acting chairman of the board of the Pensionskassen for Arkitekter og Designere.
The organiser of the election debate is the Pensionskassen for Arkitekter og Designere, where a power struggle has been going on for a few years and which is currently holding an election campaign where skeletons are increasingly coming out of the closet.
Lene Dammand Lund points to her two younger opponents, Rikke Rohr and Esther Ellingsen, who sit on either side of her, and calls them “a faction” working against the board with false accusations.
The two opposing candidates immediately respond by shaking their heads and trying to interrupt, but Lene Dammand Lund continues:
“Accusations that the board is black and that the board does not want transparency. These are spin and misinformation that have no basis in reality.”
A major squabble then unfolds, with the opposing candidates refusing to be called a faction, among other things.
“We are merely members who for several years have supported a member proposal for more ambitious climate goals that have neither been listened to nor implemented,” says Esther Ellingsen, architect and DGNB consultant at ERIK Arkitekter.
Pensionskassen for Arkitekter og Designere (PAD) is one of the country’s smallest pension funds.
But the internal disputes could have considerable consequences for Sampension, to which PAD belongs and which is one of the largest in the country.
Currently, board members and ordinary members criticise each other for climate hesitation and manipulation of numbers.
This takes place in heated debates on social media platforms such as LinkedIn.
At the centre of the conflict is a membership proposal that is gaining more and more support.
The proposers are dissatisfied with Sampension’s climate goals and transparency.
They therefore want an independent comparison of Sampension with its competitors in the climate area.
The proposal has been passed at the last two general meetings, but it has never been implemented as a majority of the board is against it.
As in many other pension funds, adopted member proposals only serve as recommendations to the PAD board of directors.
Current board member Mads Gudmand-Høyer is one of the proposal’s standard-bearers.
He is particularly critical of the lack of transparency in Sampension.
“Major parts of the investments have not been made public. This does not match a member-owned pension company in 2023. As members, we should be able to see for ourselves what we are invested in. For example, we should be able to check 100 percent if we invest in oil companies that lobby against the Paris Agreement. It is unambitious that the members’ proposal for transparency has not been better followed up on,” says Mads Gudmand-Høyer, board member of PAD and building technology consultant at The National Building Fund.
One tenth of Sampension’s investments are concealed, and this has been criticised. Read more about it here.
Due to a lack of transparency, candidates Rikke Rohr and Esther Ellingsen no longer trust Sampension and PAD.
This is what they tell us when Danwatch meets them in the King’s Garden after the election debate.
“There has been great interest in the climate agenda among the members. But when the board organised a members’ meeting prior to the last general meeting, they chose the theme of wills and inheritance. That says it all,” says Rikke Rohr, architect at Mole arkitekter, and continues:
“And when we ask the board questions in the public debate about climate change, we are either invited to closed coffee meetings or we get some homemade graphs in return. That doesn’t inspire confidence.”
This is backed up by Nicolai Bo Andersen, Professor of Sustainable Building Culture at the Royal Danish Academy.
He also supports the proposal and is unhappy with the way the PAD board has handled the members’ concerns about Sampension’s climate profile.
“At the most recent general meeting, some graphs were shown that were supposed to show that PAD is doing well in the climate area compared to others. But it was unclear who had conducted the study, what methodology was used and whether the figures are at all comparable,” the researcher says.
He is particularly critical of Sampension’s inclusion of real estate in the calculation of green investments on the website and in the material presented to the members at the congress.
Not all pension funds do this, and therfore Sampension cannot use the calculation in a comparison with its competitors, he points out.
“If the pension funds’ figures do not include exactly the same types of investments, it is like comparing apples to oranges. That’s why we want an independent study,” says Nicolai Bo Andersen.
Esther Ellingsen is also not comfortable with Sampension’s own interpretation of the pension fund’s fight for the climate.
Before the election debate, she found the Norwegian oil giant Equinor on PAD’s share list, and this confirms her belief that PAD’s claim to comply with the Paris Agreement is greenwashing, she says.
“Pensions are funds we save to ensure we can have a good old age. But when we invest in oil companies that invest in expanding the production of oil and thus counteract the Paris Agreement, we are gambling with our ability to have a pension on a habitable planet.”
She also finds it problematic that a large part of the investments in PAD are concealed.
According to PAD and Sampension, the reason for this is that the investments are placed in so-called structured credits, which include investments in loans to companies and which are subject to confidentiality.
But she’s not satisfied with that explanation.
“About 12 percent of our savings are in structured credits, and therefore the investments should be confidential, the argument goes. But when members want more transparency, you can simply reduce the share of this type of investment.”
Sampension tells Danwatch that the company conceals structured credits for competitive reasons.
However, Sampension also states that it is not bound by confidentiality clauses and that it is the company’s own choice to conceal the investments.
Lene Dammand Lund does not want to be interviewed. But at the election debate, she made it clear that Sampension is doing well in the climate area compared to other pension funds.
And that she doesn’t believe that alternatives such as AkademikerPension offer a more aggressive climate profile.
Sampension has sent a response in which they refer to the Board of Directors’ statement to PAD’s most recent general meeting.
Here, the board argues that Sampension has an objective market overview prepared that shows that Sampension performs as well as or better than other pension funds in terms of total carbon footprint, green investments and exclusion of fossil fuel companies, among other things.
However, Rikke Rohr and Esther Ellingsen think this is incorrect.
The current board says they have the same level of transparency as other pension funds. They have concealed some of the portfolio for competitive reasons, but PAD’s overall carbon footprint is fine compared to competitors, they say. Why don’t you just trust it?
“When they don’t even know if they can include their real estate as sustainable investments, I don’t trust them to be able to assess whether they are transparent, sustainable or good at communicating with their members. The trust is gone,” says Rikke Rohr.
Ester Ellingsen agrees.
She adds that she is confident that the board “is ready to look ahead and collaborate across generations on our pension management.”
It appears from the minutes of the latest general meeting that a number of dissatisfied members want to transfer to AkademikerPension. And that the possibility has been discussed at meetings between AkademikerPension and members of PAD.
You were articulated as a faction that wants to join AkademikerPension for the election debate. Is there something to it?
“The reason why we members are looking into the possibilities of transferring to another pension fund is because the board and Sampension are not taking our concerns seriously. We need to be where it makes the most sense for us,” says Rikke Rohr.
But you’re not answering the question. Do you want to join AkademikerPension?
“AkademikerPension has done what I wish PAD would have done a long time ago. They have anticipated the future and moved ambitiously on the green transition. PAD, on the other hand, has been satisfied with being average. So if those who have made positive progress want to play with us, I think we should seriously consider it.”
31/5: The article has been updated with a written response from Sampension.
“Full transparency about our efforts and investments”
This is the promise from Sampension to their 330,000 Danish pension customers.
But what you say is one thing, what you do is another.
At the end of 2022, Sampension’s total assets had a value of DKK 269 billion.
And one tenth of these investments, 26.3 billion kroner to be exact, are concealed.
The investments consist of different types of loans, and the recipients of these loans are not covered by Sampension’s transparency “for competitive or confidentiality reasons”.
The concealment causes offence at the Danish Consumer Council ‘Think’.
“You cannot have your cake and eat it too. You either have full transparency or you don’t. They will not account for every tenth krone invested, and I think that’s a lot,” says Jacob Ruben Hansen, economist at the Danish Consumer Council Think.
Customers cannot know what companies and projects are hiding behind the 26 billion kroner. Therefore, they cannot know whether their pension savings are being used to invest in controversial arms manufacturers or climate-damaging companies, for example.
“Many pension customers are concerned that their pension money is being put to good use, because we are saving a lot of money. And that is why it is important that we can trust what our pension fund tells us,” he says.
The 26 billion that Sampension is concealing consists of direct loans and so-called structured credits.
These are loans given to companies, among other things, but outside the listed market, where you find investments in the listed companies’ shares, for example.
Sampension manages the investments itself.
Lars Christian Ohnemus, Director of Center for Corporate Governance at CBS, believes that you cannot claim to have full transparency when 26 billion are not accounted for.
“10 percent is a relatively large allocation. In itself, it is not unusual that there is no transparency on individual positions when it comes to unlisted credits. There may be agreements with the borrowers that it is not disclosed for various reasons. But that is not full transparency, and then you either have to change the policy or structure your portfolio in a way that allows you to provide full transparency. This can be done, for example, by investing in unlisted credits through a fund,” he says.
Sampension recognises that there is lack of transparency about who is borrowing the many billions they have invested.
Even though that is what they have promised their 330,000 members, who include a number of public sector employees in state and municipalities, postal workers, architects and veterinarians.
However, Sampension’s ESG manager Jacob Ehlerth Jørgensen emphasises that they disclose figures for the total climate impact of their investments at sector level, and that these figures show that their credit investments overall have a relatively low climate impact.
In 2022, the total CO2 emissions from their credit portfolio were 298,000 tonnes of CO2 according to Sampension’s annual report.
“It is not about concealing black investments,” says the ESG manager.
But can you claim to be fully transparent about your investments when over 26 billion DKK are actually a black box?
“I think this can be done, as long as you provide figures for the climate impact where you cannot be fully transparent all the way down to the company level,” says the ESG manager.
However, the ESG manager would not rule out that the portfolio could include loans to controversial oil companies such as British BP, which has recently reduced its climate goals, or Norwegian Equinor, which plans to open new oil and gas fields in Arctic areas.
Could there be a BP in those 26 billion? Or an Equinor?
“In principle, this is possible. But our investments in energy companies in the credit portfolio are quite modest, and included in our carbon footprint, which is low.”
But surely you could emphasise the value of transparency and openness more, and thus invest less in markets where you cannot be transparent?
“It is not a realistic solution to cut yourself out of a market completely because you cannot be allowed to disclose individual positions. This is a problem that applies to many of the unlisted markets. It is about how to provide transparency in other ways,” says the ESG manager, who believes that Sampension’s 330,000 Danish pension customers can be proud of how their pension savings are managed.
“If I were a customer, I would look at the overall climate impact of the portfolio, and I would be proud of the development that has taken place at Sampension. Ultimately, it is a question of trust when it comes to the parts of the portfolio that we cannot fully disclose. But we really do make an effort to be as transparent as we can,” he says.
Providing aggregated figures for the climate impact of investments will not solve the problem of lack of transparency, according to the Danish Consumer Council ‘Think.
“It may well be that there are companies, which supply the upstream sector of the oil industry or which are suppliers to coal mines. We cannot know, and that is a problem,” says Jacob Ruben Hansen.
He emphasises that it is Sampension itself that has chosen to invest in a way that goes against their own promises of full transparency.
“It is not uncommon for pension funds to have unlisted assets in their portfolio. But then you have to specify what kind of assets you have. And if they believe they cannot provide insight into the assets, then they have to build a portfolio that matches their goal and values of full transparency. After all, it is their choice,” says Jacob Ruben Hansen from the Danish Consumer Council ‘Think.
It allegedly came as a shock to the top management of the Danish paint-producing giant, Hempel, when it was discovered in 2019 that the controversial Crimean Bridge was painted with the company’s products.
According to the Danish management, they had been “deceived” by Russian employees who had sold products to the Russian bridge between 2016 and 2019, despite the fact that the bridge is subject to severe EU sanctions and condemned by the UN General Assembly. Hempel’s management denies having any knowledge of the sales when they were carried out.
Today, Danwatch can reveal that during the same period, there was extensive and publicly available evidence that Hempel’s products were used on a large scale on the bridge.
A large number of photos and videos, where Hempel’s characteristic blue and silver paint buckets are clearly visible, have been shared and discussed for years in Russian news media, on social media, on internet forums, and by Hempel’s own business partners in Russia – including the company SSK-Protekt LLC, from whom the video at the top of this article originates.
SSK-Protekt prides itself on being the official Hempel representative in the Arkhangelsk region and has previously stated to local media in Russia that it has painted 300,000 square meters of the Crimean Bridge.
The photos document that Hempel’s products have been used on the bridge as far back as the summer of 2017.
The Kerch Strait Bridge connects the Crimean Peninsula with the mainland of Russia and was constructed between 2014 and 2020 after Russia’s annexation of Crimea.
According to Jakob Tolstrup, a Ph.D. and Associate Professor at the Department of Political Science at Aarhus University, the Crimean Bridge is one of Vladimir Putin’s key prestige projects and plays a central role in Russia’s war against Ukraine.
“The bridge holds great significance in the ongoing conflict as Russia uses it as a logistical supply route, including to bring in a significant amount of military equipment to Crimea. Furthermore, the waters around the bridge are the center of all naval activities from the Russian side in connection with attacks on Ukraine,” says Tolstrup.
With a length of 19 kilometers, the Kerch Strait Bridge is the longest bridge in Europe and the largest ever built by Russia. With a price tag of almost DKK 22 billion, it is also likely the most expensive.
According to various sources, 100,000 liters of protective paint were used in three layers on the iconic arches alone. Additionally, many kilometers of metal construction also require similar protection against corrosion.
It is difficult to determine exactly which parts of the bridge were painted with Hempel products. However, Danwatch’s research indicates that several companies used Hempel for various parts of the bridge. Image and video evidence shows that several large sections of the main structure were painted with Hempel, including sections 62-63, 113-114, and 134-135.
One of the companies, Koldi-Prof, is a certified representative and distributor of Hempel in Russia. On its website, the company mentions that it has worked on over 20,000 square meters of the bridge.Another company, SSK-Protekt, is also an official Hempel representative and has previously stated that they have painted 300,000 square meters of the bridge.
Nevertheless, Hempel maintains that no one in the management had any knowledge of wrongdoing and that the entire responsibility lies with a group of Russian employees who deceived Hempel by concealing the deliveries in the order books.
Danwatch has obtained a statement made to the Danish Business Authority, prepared by the law firm Kromann Reumert on behalf of Hempel A/S. The statement was submitted after the company discovered the deliveries in 2019.
The statement also states that deliveries to the bridge connecting Russia to Crimea, which has been subject to EU sanctions since 2014 as a result of Russia’s illegal annexation of the peninsula that year, had previously been discussed internally in Hempel.
“As part of the investigation, it has been established that the bridge was discussed internally in Hempel Russia and with Hempel A/S, but that it was concluded and clearly instructed by Hempel A/S that Hempel Russia could not be involved in Crimea-related infrastructure projects for sanctioning reasons,” the statement reads.
Still, according to the statement, a group of Russian employees began selling products for the bridge on their own:
“Furthermore, it has been established that certain employees of Hempel Russia deliberately ignored this decision and instruction, and for some reason, decided not to block orders related to the bridge going forward. Instead, misleading project names were created to hide from the Hempel Group that Hempel Russia was involved in projects related to the Crimean Bridge.”
In the statement, Hempel emphasized that the employees responsible for the deliveries were all of Russian nationality. As a result, the company does not believe that the former director of Hempel Russia, Peter de Groot, would have had knowledge of the deliveries.
As Danwatch recently wrote, Peter de Groot presented a plan in August 2016 to double production in Russia over five years during a working meeting in Russia with Governor Sergey Morozov. Richard Sand, who is chairman of the board of the Hempel Foundation, which owns Hempel A/S, was also present at the meeting, as well as Hempel’s then CEO, Henrik Andersen, who is now the CEO of Vestas.
In 2017, Hempel Russia’s revenue increased from DKK 186 million in 2015 to a record of DKK 400 million, fulfilling the prediction made in 2016.
Hempel emphasizes in the statement to the Danish Business Authority that the management had no knowledge of the deliveries to the Krim bridge.
“Hempel A/S has, as part of the internal investigation, investigated the involvement of Hempel A/S and the role of the Hempel Group. The conclusion is that neither Hempel A/S nor the Hempel Group has had any role or involvement in the projects, which are in violation of applicable laws and regulations. The conclusion is therefore that the EU sanctions have not been breached.”
Danwatch has presented the documentation to Hempel and asked why it wasn’t discovered until 2019 that Hempel products were used on the bridge.
“As previously announced, in 2019 we became aware of the circumstances during a routine internal audit of our Russian subsidiary,” Hempel responded in an email.
How many liters of Hempel products have subsequently been found to have been delivered to Crimea? How big was the revenue from these sales?
“We do not share information about the size or value of historical transactions.”
How many employees of Hempel Russia were involved in the alleged fraud of selling Hempel products to the Crimea bridge?
“We do not share specific information about former employees.”
Was the top management of Hempel in Russia, including Peter de Groot, involved in this fraud?
“We do not share specific information about former employees.”
According to documents from the Danish Business Authority regarding the investigation by Kromann Reumert in Russia of sales to the Crimean Bridge and the fleet, it appears that Hempel became aware in 2016 that there was demand for Hempel products for the bridge. Did this lead to increased awareness of ensuring that Hempel products did not end up on the bridge?
“This demand was specific to a particular country in which Hempel operates, and an investigation at the time showed that Hempel in that country had not delivered to the bridge, and the case was closed. We in no way wanted our products to be used on the Kerch bridge and had clearly communicated internal policies and guidelines in the area,” Hempel writes, adding:
“We strongly distance ourselves from the fact that some of our products ended up on the Kerch bridge, and we are still disappointed that this could happen.”
“As previously mentioned, we had external legal experts and business investigators thoroughly investigate the matter. They assured us that there was no breach of sanctions. We also, as you know, informed the relevant Danish authorities about what had happened.”
Danwatch also asked Hempel why the director of Hempel Russia, Peter de Groot, extended the official collaboration with the Russian company Koldi Prof in March 2020, when Koldi Prof’s own pictures of their work on the bridge reveal several buckets of Hempel products (see the image gallery above).
“Hempel Russia did not supply the bridge painting system to Koldi Prof. As part of Hempel’s investigation, Hempel received confirmation from Koldi Prof that they did not use Hempel products in their work on the bridge. Therefore, Koldi Prof was not blocked as a future Hempel distributor.”
The heartbreaking images from Kabul airport of desperate Afghans trying to escape by clinging to US military planes on the runway show how the NATO alliance is currently operating in violation of international law, leading expert in international law expert and professor at The University of Sydney Law School, Ben Saul, told Danwatch.
Pictures and footage from the airport clearly show that Afghans trying to escape the Taliban cannot leave the country through the US-controlled airport. And that may be a breach of the US and NATO member states’ human rights obligations, said Ben Saul who teaches at Oxford and Harvard Law School.
This is, perhaps, one of the saddest images I’ve seen from #Afghanistan. A people who are desperate and abandoned. No aid agencies, no UN, no government. Nothing. pic.twitter.com/LCeDEOR3lR
— Nicola Careem (@NicolaCareem) August 16, 2021
“If NATO and the US effectively control the airport, then they must respect their human rights obligations towards the Afghans, which includes their right to freely leave their country”, he told Danwatch.
According to international news agencies, the US military took control of Kabul airport on Sunday afternoon and announced shortly after that all civil flights from the Afghan airport had been suspended.
Instead, the airport was used for military flights and the evacuation of citizens of NATO member states, including Danish embassy staff, as well as the Afghans who have worked for NATO countries.
Danwatch has asked Ben Saul if it is in accordance with international law to take control of the airport and close it to commercial flights.
“Prioritizing the evacuation of foreigners on military flights, over Afghans on civilian flights, could involve arbitrary, unlawful interference in the right of Afghans to leave their own country, combined with discrimination on the basis of nationality”, he told Danwatch.
According to the news agency Reuters, US soldiers have fired warning shots amongst the many Afghan civilians who have sought refuge at the airport. Several media outlets reported casualties on Monday, including among civilians who have clung to planes as they were taking off from the airport.
Min gode ven som jeg arbejder med feks. Som jeg ikke kunne hjælpe ud. Som nu står i lufthavnens kaos med sin familie og håber på et mirakel. Og er bange for at tage tilbage til byen gennem Talebans kontrolposter. https://t.co/LkWknMsxK1
— Puk Damsgård (@PukDamsgaard) August 16, 2021
Ben Saul notes that the US, which controls the airport, does not appear to make any assessment of the security needs of the Afghan civilians arriving at the airport, other than those already designated by NATO member states.
“There does not seem to be any system in place for prioritizing which Afghans who reach the airport need evacuation more than others, other than that some were previously selected by foreign states”, he said.
According to Ben Saul, the possible violations of international law apply regardless of whether the United States and NATO have made an agreement with the Afghan authorities to take control of the airport or not.
“Hi Sister, do you want to sell your kidney?”
This is the question posed by an eager middleman when the Iranian exile media Zamaneh recently created a fake profile on Instagram to reveal how illegal organ trafficking takes place in Iran.
Within a few days, the journalists received numerous offers from middlemen and desperate patients offering up to 300 million toman for a kidney. According to the official Iranian exchange rate, this is around 6.000 euro.
The buyers are wealthy kidney patients who are willing to pay to get a kidney, bypassing the official Iranian waiting list.
Among other things, Zamaneh reveals that up to half of all kidney transplants in Iran take place with organs purchased on the black market – a trade that has increasingly shifted to the openly accessible part of the internet, including Instagram.
The French lawyer Dan Shefet, who is a specialist in digital responsibility, is shocked that yet another criminal activity has found its way to the social media platforms.
“It is shocking that it is now going on openly, on e.g. Instagram. In the past, illegal activities took place especially on the dark network, where people surfed around using the Tor browser, so that no one could track their IP address “, says Dan Shefet.
Organ trafficking is banned in most countries, but there is no international legislation forbidding it. In Iran it is legal to receive state compensation when donating an organ, but it is not legal to sell and buy organs freely. According to Zameneh’s research, the Iranian authorities are turning a blind eye to the illegal organ trafficking.
“It means that everything else being equal, it has become significantly more accessible”.
Organ trafficking is banned in the majority of countries worldwide, but according to experts in digital responsibility Instagram cannot be made legally responsible for content posted on the Facebook-owned platform.
In Iran, the digital market for organs is run by a network of discreet intermediaries who connect buyers and sellers and provide the practicalities of the transplants, which among other places take place at a well renowned hospital in Tehran.
But the problem of organ trafficking is neither new nor limited to Iran.
In recent years international media have reported on major problems with organ trafficking in places like Lebanon, Egypt, and Asia, where especially desperate refugees resort to selling their organs.
According to the World Health Organization WHO between five and ten percent of all organ transplants in the world take place with illegally acquired organs.
In 2018 146,840 transplant operations were performed worldwide according to the Global Observatory on Donation and Transplantation. If the WHO estimates are correct this means that somewhere between 7,000-14,000 of these operations were carried out with illegally acquired organs.
According to the WHO, the need for organs is at least ten times greater than the number of operations performed, creating the perfect conditions for an illegal market. Especially the need for kidneys is growing rapidly. In 2010, 2.6 million kidney patients were on the waiting lists and the number is expected to grow to 5.4 million by 2030, according to the International Society of Nephrology.
The WHO emphasizes that the organ trafficking is characterized by wealthy patients buying organs illegally or unethically from poor and vulnerable people, either in their own country or abroad.
And the organization warns that illegal organ trafficking is unlikely to decrease in the coming years.
“Poverty, unemployment, and the lack of socio-economic opportunities are factors that make people vulnerable to organ trafficking. In the current situation of many refugees and migrants and the financial crisis the world is facing (due to corona, red), we must pay extra attention to protecting the affected populations,” a WHO spokesman says.
Illegal organ trafficking is not a new phenomenon, but it is new that trade takes place openly on the internet.
As Zamaneh’s research shows organ trafficking takes place in many places on the web, for example on special websites, in the comments under ordinary media articles on the subject, and on social media such as Instagram.
Like attorney Dan Shefet, several other experts on digital responsibility believe that Instagram has a shared responsibility when their platform is being used for illegal activities.
However, with the current legislation it is not possible to hold Instagram accountable for crimes committed on the service’s platform.
“The starting point is that social media has immunity. In the EU, however, they must remove illegal content when they become aware of it”, says Dan Shefet.
This means that instagram is committed to e.g. remove the accounts that Zamaneh’s research has uncovered.
“Organ trafficking is illegal, and Instagram must of course remove postings from the group of people who buy and sell organs”, says Dan Shefet, an advisor to UNESCO, the EU and other international bodies on digital responsibility.
Sten Schaumburg Müller, professor of media law at the University of Southern Denmark, agrees.
“EU law requires information services to remove illegal content as soon as the media becomes aware of it,” he says.
Despite several inquiries, neither Instagram nor its owner, Facebook have agreed to an interview about organ trafficking on their platforms.
A spokesperson for Facebook does however declare in an email, that “Facebook does not allow the use of our platforms for trafficking in organs”.
“We have clear rules against human exploitation on Facebook and Instagram, which includes organ trafficking. We use a combination of humans and proactive detection technology to identify and remove violating content as quickly as possible, and we encourage people to report content they see that they think breaks our rules”, the Facebook spokesperson writes.
Facebook further informs us that the service has removed three of the instagram accounts mentioned in the investigation by Zamaneh.
The service has not been able to locate two additional instagram profiles.
Dan Shefet and Sten Schaumburg Müller are emphasizing that this is how far Instagram responsibility goes at the moment.
“The lack of responsibility is the same whether the issue is organ trafficking, the sale of rhino powder, ivory or pedophilia,” said Dan Shefet, noting that the European Court of Justice recently acquitted the Amazon digital market place of liability in connection tothe illegal sale of counterfeit goods.
“The next thing will probably be that you can buy and sell organs on Amazon”, he predicts,and emphasizes the need to tighten legislation on digital responsibility.
Ask Hesby Krogh, deputy chairman of the Danish advocacy group Digital Responsibility agrees.
“So far, big social media have been able to avoid any responsibility for what goes on on their platforms. Social media has almost been regarded as a kind of telecommunications company, which is also not responsible for what people use their telephone connection for”, he says.
“It would be nice if the moderation systems that the social media industry has created was working, but they do not. Legislation is needed,” he says.
According to Digital Responsibility, services like Facebook and Instagram should be responsible for user-generated content.
“It may be resource-intensive to keep track of what’s going on on a large platform, but it must be something that companies take into account when designing their business model,” he says.
“Facebook creating an internal appeal system is not enough. It should be democratically elected politicians who legislate on digital responsibility”, he says. “Single countries should move ahead with national legislation. They do not have to wait for the EU or the UN to act. It is better to have legislation in some countries than no rules at all,” he says.
There are no international laws on social media responsibility for user content. In recent years, several countries have chosen to legislate nationally to combat the spread of illegal and harmful content via social media.
Denmark has no law regarding the responsibility of social media, but a majority in the parliament has said that they want to legislate about it.
There have been changes in the Danish penal code – i.a. caused by cases of illegal image sharing – but the responsibilities of social media have not yet been clearly established.
According to Danish criminal law, “anyone who has contributed to the act by incitement, advice or deed” can be punished, but there has not been a judicial review of the liability of social media under applicable law.
For all EU countries, however, the so-called E-Commerce Directive applies. It provides an exemption of liability for “information services” that provide a platform for the exchange and storage of information.
The precondition for being exempted from liability is that the service has no knowledge of the illegal content.
If an information service is made aware of illegal content, they must respond and remove the content. A so-called “notice and take down” system.
Today, anyone can draw attention to illegal content on e.g. Facebook, Twitter and Youtube. If the information service itself has edited the content, the service usually has knowledge of the content and is therefore liable.
In 2017 Germany passed a law on social media responsibility known as The Facebook law. The law complies social media with over two million users to remove manifestly illegal content within 24 hours and other illegal content within seven days – after the social media has received a complaint about the content.
If social media service does not comply with the law, they risk fines of up to 50 million euros. 87 pct. of the Germans support the new law, which is considered to be pioneering.
In 2019, France adopted a law on social media, modeled on the German law.
The french law requires social media to remove manifestly illegal content within 24 hours of becoming aware of it.
If the content is not removed within 24 hours, social media can be fined up to about 100 million euros or – in the case of extremely serious violations – up to four percent of their global income.
The law is supported by 82 percent of the French.
In 2019, Australia passed a law on social media responsibility in the wake of the so-called Christchurch massacre – two mass shootings against mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, one of which was live streamed on Facebook.
The law obliges social media to remove postings of a particularly violent nature – such as murder, rape, kidnapping and terrorism. The notices must be removed quickly and the police must be informed. If social media do not do this, they risk fines of up to 10 percent of their annual profits.
In addition, employees of social media can be sentenced to three years in prison.
Since 2019 the UK has tested a legislative model that complies social media to improve the quality of their monitoring and editing.
Among the initiatives, an independent regulator has been set up, that can both monitor what is shared on social media and issue fines to social media that do not remove harmful content quickly.
The regulator will initially be funded by social media, but the government is considering introducing a tax to make the model sustainable in the future.
With the UK model, social media will still have to hire moderators to assess and remove offensive content, but in future the moderators will have to follow the standards of the independent authority. 82 pct. of the British support the initiative.
In the United States, social media cannot generally be held accountable for the content on their platforms. The so-called Communications Decency Act from 1996, the social platforms provide immunity.
But the matter is being widely debated at the moment.
In 2019, the US Consumer and Competition Authority fined Facebook nearly 4.5 billion euro for violating users’ privacy by passing on information on 87 million users in the so-called Cambridge Analytica case on the impact of the US election in 2016. The case is considered a breakthrough.
69 pct. of Americans support a law on social media responsibilities.
COVID-19 has thrown the garment industry supply chain into disarray, and Southeast Asian garment workers are feeling its ripple effects. As the world’s largest textile exporter, China accounted for about 38% of the global total in 2018 according to the World Bank. Chinese factory closures due to COVID-19 have created raw material shortages and heavily disrupted the garment industry in Cambodia, Myanmar, and Vietnam. Since the beginning of the year, 20 factories in Myanmar and 15 factories in Cambodia have shut down, suspended operations, or heavily reduced their workforce.
While exact numbers are not available, at least 42,000 workers are affected by factory suspensions or closures. A number of the affected factories produced apparel for the Danish clothing company Bestseller and UK supermarket chains Tesco and Sainsbury.
Though the economic downturn affects everyone, including brands and factory management, the ones hit hardest are usually those who can least afford it, Bent Gehrt of Workers Rights Consortium notes.
“Right now if you look at the economic situation, brands are not posting record profits this year. But, they’ve had a great decade with these workers working for them and now they’re just being discarded and left with nothing.”
Gehrt said Cambodian factory closures have affected 10,000 workers and estimates an additional 15,000 were affected through workforce reductions. However, Gehrt cautions that the actual number may be much higher. About 200,000 workers are employed through Cambodian subcontracting factories, and if the main factories are reducing their workforces, subcontractors may not be receiving work orders at all, Gehrt said.
Vietnamese workers who are properly enrolled in social security will receive unemployment benefits based on the amount of time they’ve been employed. In Myanmar, unemployed workers will continue to receive healthcare benefits but not unemployment benefits because there had been no request for unemployment benefit from the Social Security Board, Thein Swe, Myanmar’s Minister of Labour Immigration and Population, said. Cambodian Labour Ministry spokesperson Heng Sour said the ministry requires factories with suspended operations to pay workers 40% of the minimum wage for a total of USD 76 per month.
Yet not all laid off workers will receive proper compensation. After closing or suspending operations, a number of factory owners have simply run off, according to Cambodian and Burmese officials.
Though China has recently resumed production, garment workers’ employment situations are unlikely to improve. Just this past week, Denmark and several other EU nations opted to close retail shops as part of their COVID-19 containment strategies. These retail closures produce lower demand, resulting in fewer orders for garment factories.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to affect garment workers, labor groups including Clean Clothes Campaign, Worker Rights Consortium, International Labor Rights Forum, and Maquila Solidarity Network have called on brands to minimize the pandemic’s impact on workers’ health and livelihoods.
“Brands must stand by the workers who make their clothes and take active steps to ensure they continue to receive their wages during factory closures or sick leave. We are calling on brands to publicly commit to proper due diligence with regards to the unfolding events resulting from COVID-19,” the labor groups wrote in an open letter.
After several human rights violations, the European Branded Clothing Alliance (EBCA) has voiced support for the European Commission’s decision to limit Cambodia’s preferential trade access to the EU market. The violations include the silencing of political opponents to the incumbent party.
Among others, EBCA represents global clothing brands like H&M, Levi’s, Ralph Lauren, and app. 60 other brands.
Since 2001, Cambodia has enjoyed preferential trade access under the Commission’s Everything But Arms (EBA) scheme, which grants select developing countries full duty-free and quota-free access to the EU Single Market for all products except arms and armaments. EBA status is granted to countries on the condition that they respect international human rights treaties and core International Labour Organisation conventions.
Cambodia is the second-largest beneficiary of EBA trade preferences, according to the European Commission (EC). In 2018, EU imports from Cambodia totaled €5.3 billion, 95% of which entered the EU duty-free under EBA. Clothing and textiles account for around three quarters of EU imports from Cambodia (€4 billion).
Following a 12-month review, the European Commission cites civil, labor, and human rights violations over the past three years as the reason behind its recommendation to partially withdraw tariff preferences from Cambodia. Key violations include the Cambodian government’s crackdown on independent media, its dissolution of the Cambodian National Rescue Party (CNRP), and its arrest of CNRP leader Kem Sokha, other politicians, journalists, and activists.
The Garment Manufacturers Association in Cambodia (GMAC) responded to the EC’s recommendation, citing that the workers in Cambodia’s garment industry will be hard hit by the decision.
“The partial withdrawal announced on Feb. 12 will affect the workers’ livelihoods, especially women,” GMAC said.
“We urge the EC and members of the European Parliament to reconsider their decision by taking into account the values and goals that the programme was based on when it was put in place nearly 20 years ago: development assistance, poverty reduction and the dignity of employment.”
GMAC notes that the EBA-supported garment sector has lifted millions of Cambodians out of poverty – workers who would be left vulnerable following the EC’s decision.
The European Branded Clothing Alliance recognizes that the decision from the European Commission will have a large socio-economic impact on the most vulnerable parts of the Cambodian population. Still, the EBCA voices support for the recommendation and encourages Cambodian authorities to work with the EC to rectify outstanding violations.
“We urge the Cambodian authorities to commit to a better respecting of human and worker rights, as well as allowing more room for domestic political debate. We also would call upon the Commission to establish a clear road-map and timeline for the Royal Government of Cambodia in order to track progress over the coming months,” the EBCA said.
The EC’s withdrawal of tariff preferences from Cambodia and their replacement with the EU’s standard tariffs will take effect on 12 August 2020. In related news, while the EC restricted trade with Cambodia, they moved to open EU markets to Vietnam despite calls for further improvement to the country’s human rights policies.
We have become better at eating fish over the last years, but we can do better, Danish Health Authorities say. Fish are full of selenium, iodine and d-vitamins, hence, we should all eat about 350 grams of fish per week.
However, the wild fish stock of the World are not doing well. The UN Agricultural Organisation (FAO) have warned about overfishing, whilst breeding of especially salmon and trout have exploded over the last few years.
Norway is the World’s largest producer of farmed salmon. Every year Norway produces around a million tons of salmon to markets around the world. In comparison, Denmark produced around 48.000 tons of fish and shellfish in 2017, according to Danish National Statistics.
But farmed fish also eat fish. And this is where the problems start to occur.
Catching fish for fish feed instead as food for humans drains the World’s oceans from small, so called pelagic fish. The pelagic species are sandeel, anchovies and krill, which are all an import food source for larger fish. That worries experts that Danwatch have spoken to.
“The increasing demand for fishmeal for aquaculture is putting a lot of pressure on pelagics worldwide and aquaculture demand for animal protein is increasing, today this demand is in competition with human consumption, says Philippe Cury, senior scientist at Institut de Recherche pour le Développement in Belgium.
“The pelagics should be used for food not for feeding animals”.
Fish farming means cheaper fish, which again can lead to more nutritious dietary around the world, supporters of fish farming says. Critics, however, say that the increase in the number of aquaculture farms make the demand for fish for fish feed larger. Fish, which could have been eaten by humans instead, they claim.
A study from 2017, Most fish destined for fishmeal production are fool-grade fish, concluded, that 90 percent of the fish used in fish feed could have been eaten by humans.
Daniel Pauly from the University of British Columbia is one of the authors behind the study, and have been researching fishing populations in West Africa for two decades:
“If edible fish are made into fish meal, it increases the price of fish for humans, who have to eat them and that affects food safety. West Africa have a large problem with food safety, especially because of climate change”, says Daniel Pauly.
In June 2019, Greenpeace published a report, A Waste of Fish, which concludes that “food safety and livelihood for the local community in West Africa is being threatened by the expansion of the fish meal and fish oil industries in Mauritania, Senegal and Gambia”.
Dr. Ibrahima Cisse, Oceans Campaign Manager for Greenpeace, says:
“We are losing hundreds of thousands of edible fish to the fish meal and fish oil exporters, and this potentially affects 40 million African consumers”.
The fishing boats are busy in the port of Nouadhibou, Mauritania.Just like in oceans, lakes and rivers species like zander, turbot, salmon and trout in farms live of fish, small pelagic fish. Therefore, industrial fisheries around the world catch species like sardines, anchovies and krill, which are made into fish meal and fish oil, and then sold as animal feed.
About one fifth of the world’s catches of wild fish are used for fish meal or fish oil, and the majority of this is turned into fish feed.
Now back to the salmon.
If a farmed salmon is caught, when it weighs between two and five kilos, it has eaten between two and nine kilos of fish feed. Fish feed consists mainly of plants, algae or soy and cut offs from fish factories, which are heads, tales and fish bones, and about 30 percent fish flour. In total, five kilos of pelagic fish are needed for one kilo of fish meal.
This means, that a farmed salmon between two and five kilos have eaten between three and 13.5 kilos of pelagic fish, when it is ready to be caught and sold in stores.
Facts
9 kg of fish fead, which consist of
about 6 kg of plants, algae, soy and cut offs from filet factories
3 kg of fish meal
It takes approximately 13,5 kg to produce 3 kg of fish meal
Sources: Marine Ingredient Denmark, Seafish.org, Greenpeace ect.
One of the places that experiences overfishing of pelagic fish is Mauritania in West Africa. Once, there was plenty of fish in the seas of Mauritania, but today the three largest pelagic species, round and flat sardinella and bonga, are disappearing, according to FAOs latest evaluation.
Bonga, round and flat sardinella are all used for fish meal and fish oil.
“These species are widely overfished”, says Daniel Pauly.
On average, every Mauritian eat between eight and 20 kilos of fish per year, according to FAOs calculations, and many of these fish are sardinella and bonga.
During recent years, these species have been increasingly attractive to an increasing amount of factories located along the coast, east of the countries largest coastal city, Nouadhibou.
The fishermen in Nouadhibou sell a lot of their catch to these factories that make the fishes into fish meal and fish oil, which is exported to Russia, China and the EU. The fish meal and -oil industry is increasing and have made Mauritania into one of West Africa’s largest exporters of pelagic fishes.
“This industry will destroy the Sardinella stock in the region, but not before it will have reduced the local consumption of fish, i.e. affected the incomes and food security of the people in West-Africa”, Daniel Pauly writes in an email to Danwatch.
Most of the fish meal and – oil imported to Denmark comes from Iceland, Norway and Chile, and the West African countries, Morocco and Mauritania, are number seven on the list. In 2018, Mauritania was the seventh largest supplier of fish oil to Denmark, and Morocco was the seventh largest supplier of fish meal, statistics from the Danish Fisheries Agency show.
We asked Philippe Cury, what companies could do to refrain from affecting food security in West Africa, when they buy fish meal and fish oil from Mauritania and Morocco.
“They should stop”, is his answer in short.
“West Africa has a large problem with food security, and it is serious”.
Thomas Kambi is still waiting. It has been now almost two months since he was fired from Maersk’s subcontractor Island Marine Service – officially because he is too old and unable to deliver – according to himself and his union because he was the initiator for his crew to join a Union.
And the Island Marine Service maintains its decision:
“There is no dialogue. We have just sent a follow-up to the union that he should come and collect his salary. It’s up to him to come and pick up his last hire,” says director Hamisi Ali.
When Danwatch first wrote about Thomas Kambi’s dismissal in August this year, A.P. Møller-Maersk stated that a “thorough” investigation into the dismissal would be conducted. The investigation has now been completed, but Maersk will not disclose what has actually been communicated to the subcontractor.
“However, the case in question is not over on our part. We will continue to be in dialogue with the subcontractor on this matter, which will be completed in a proper manner,” writes press manager Signe Wagner to Danwatch.
[Boks1]
Thomas Kambi was fired three days after he, along with 15 colleagues, put his signature on a union registration form. At the same time, in the wake of Danwatch’s disclosure of poor working conditions at the port of Mombasa (in danish), Maersk underlined, among other things, that employees of the shipping giant’s suppliers would be able to organize themselves into unions.
“It is clear that those working for our suppliers should be able to report freely on working conditions that do not meet our standards without fear of reprisals,” Maersk said in August.
Thomas Kambi doesn’t think he’ll get his job back:
“I hope for compensation. And then I have to try to find another job in the harbor. “
[Boks3]
Carlsberg were adamant in their response, when they were confronted earlier this year with water samples indicating serious pollution of the great Narayani River, a river which is home to several endangered animal species, just off the Carlsberg brewery in Nepal.
Water samples obtained by Danwatch and P1 Orientering in December 2017 and again in February 2018, showed pollution levels exceeding the national maximum permissible limits in both Nepal and Denmark.
Experts estimated that there was a risk of oxygen deficiency and fish kill in the river because of the pollution. They also stated that the source of the pollution most likely came from Carlsberg’s brewery in Nepal, Gorkha Brewery, because samples taken 500 meters upstream from the brewery showed a river which was not polluted.
Carlsberg disagreed though.
The Danish beer giant could “only conclude that the water samples collected by Danwatch do not represent values from Gorkha Brewery”. Therefore, the samples had been collected incorrectly, Carlsberg claimed.
Today, it’s a different story coming from the company which, backed by Danish development funds, is now dominating the beer market in Nepal.
Since the publication of our investigation in March, Danwatch has been in touch with local sources. They have informed us, that the brewery has made operational changes as a result of investigations conducted in the wake of Danwatch’s revelations.
When asked about the results of these investigations, Carlsberg Group’s media director now acknowledges that Gorkha Brewery was indeed a source of pollution.
“Our Supply Chain team traveled to Nepal to see this first hand, because we could not recognize the results of your tests. There were obviously circumstances that did not conform to our own internal measurements,” Carlsberg’s media director Kasper Elbjørn told Danwatch.
Carlsberg’s experts found that the brewery’s wastewater treatment plant was working well, but that there were other effluents from the brewery which caused pollution of the Narayani river.
“When they did not find problems with the wastewater treatment plant, they examined the area and the river around the brewery, where they identified three possible sources of the increased values”, Kasper Elbjørn said.
One of the culprits was drainage from spent grains, which is organic waste from beer production which can be used for animal feed. The brewery distributed the spent grain to local farmers from an area next to one of the brewery gates, situated right next to the river.
Therefore, they immediately halted the distribution of spent grain to local farmers from the area next to the river, Elbjørn said.
“They identified the wet spent grains as a source of pollution, because the farmers handled the spent grains inappropriately. We take responsibility for this pollution, which is why we stopped it immediately. Now, Gorkha distributes spent grains directly to the farmers”, he said.
The organic waste is not the only cause behind the pollution of the river. When it rains in Nepal, it can rain a lot. Rain water accumulated on the brewery grounds, can also lead to pollution of the river.
“We also found evidence that rainwater that runs into the river from the brewery, may contain excessively high values. We have solved this issue now with some minor investments in rainwater drainage, which is now directed through Gorkha’s wastewater treatment plants”, Elbjørn said.
The results of Carlsberg’s studies do not surprise Henrik Rasmus Andersen, professor and wastewater expert at the Technical University of Denmark (DTU). Henrik Rasmus Andersen has continuously maintained that the pollution most likely came from the Carlsberg brewery.
“These are plausible explanations from Carlsberg. These are the typical reasons why breweries operating in poor countries, despite the fact that they have established wastewater treatment plants, often contribute to water pollution”.
He explains that it is common practice – also in Denmark – that spent grain from breweries is distributed to farmers.
“It is organic waste, which will result in pollution if it flows into the river. The spent grains are probably the main cause of pollution, it also explains the results we saw in the water samples”, Andersen said.
“I do not know what a court in Nepal would conclude, but in Denmark it would be their responsibility. Carlsberg certainly has moral responsibility for the pollution. The spent grain is a byproduct of their production, and the distribution takes place on their grounds”, Andersen said.
Carlsberg says that in addition to stopping the distribution of spent grains from the river bank and treating the rain water, they have also been digging into the Narayani River.
“We found that there is a reduced water flow in the river branch receiving the treated wastewater from the brewery. Therefore, they made a dredging to improve the flow during periods of low water levels,” said media director Kasper Elbjørn.
That, however, puzzles the DTU professor. The water pollution will become more difficult to detect if the water flow in the river increases, he imagines.
“The low water flow in the river does not in itself explain the high values. Rather, this is about increasing the flow in case you would return to take additional samples”, Andersen said.
Nepal is not the only country where Carlsberg has caused water pollution in recent years. In both Laos, Malawi and China, breweries owned by Carlsberg have polluted their surroundings.
Now they are gathering the experiences from the pollution case in Nepal, they say.
“This is an isolated case, but obviously we have gathered the experiences and shared them with breweries in other parts of the world, because of this incident in Nepal. We now know, that potential sources of pollution that are not connected to the sewage system, may occur. And we are affected just as much as society is, if rivers or groundwater at our breweries are polluted”, Elbjørn told Danwatch.
The case also has consequences for Carlsberg’s sustainability strategy, which among other things is about protecting water in high-risk areas around the Carlsberg breweries towards 2030.
“We have compiled the experiences and shared them with those in charge of implementing the strategies, due to Danwatch’s inquiries about Nepal”, Elbjørn said.
The third largest pension fund in Denmark, Sampension, excludes four publicly traded companies from their portfolio. The blacklisting happens after Danwatch in January this year, in the investigation Business on Occupied Territory, documented that Sampension is the Danish pension fund that has invested the largest sum of money in companies doing business in or around the illegal Israeli settlements. The Danwatch-investigation has lead the pension fund to revise its investment guidelines, the fund stated in a press release dated 2. October (Links to Press Release in Danish).
All of the four companies are excluded for violating Sampension’s new guidelines for investments in occupied territories.
”Based on our new policy we have reviewed whether or not there are companies in our portfolio which are listed in Vigeo Eiris’ BIOL-database (Business in Occupied Lands)”, explains director of investments in Sampension, Henrik Olejasz Larsen, in the press release.
“The result of our review is that two Israeli banks, Hapoalim and Leumi, as well as Heidelberg Cement and Bezeq, has been placed on our list of excluded companies due to the financing of settlements, and the extraction of natural resources and establishment of infrastructure for telecommunication on occupied territory”, the press release states.
Last week the organisation Human Rights Watch documented that Israeli banks are violating the human rights of palestinians, as well as international law, through their financing of new infrastructure projects that cement the occupation of Palestinian territory.
Investments in the occupied territories are problematic also because Danish investors are undermining both Denmark’s and the EU’s official policy of supporting a two-state solution as a solution to the conflict between Israel and Palestine.
Sampension had invested a total of 400 million Danish kroner in Israeli and international companies with activities in settlements on the West Bank when Danwatch investigated the investments in January this year.
Then, Sampension stated that they had no specific investment policy for the occupied territories, but that all of their investments must respect human rights, no matter where the companies are doing business.
Today Sampension informs that they, apart from the four blacklisted companies, are also initiating a dialogue with an additional six companies about their possible business activities in the settlements.
See the full list of companies excluded by Sampension here.
Sampension’s policy change does not lead to any immediate policy changes with other Danish pension funds who hold similar investments.
In a survey Danwatch has asked seven investment funds, who all held investments in banks operating on the West Bank when Danwatch investigated the matter in January 2017, if they plan to exclude or in other ways take action against the companies.
Only three of the funds have replied to the survey – none of which have ended their investments in banks doing business on occupied land.
Denmark’s largest bank, Danske Bank, confirms that they still hold investments in the two banks excluded by Sampension, Hapoalim and Leumi. In their latest investment portfolio made available to the public Danske Bank held 560.000 Danish kroner in Bank Hapoalim, and 930.000 Danish kroner in Bank Leumi.
They do not intend to keep an extra eye on the Israeli banks operating on the West Bank.
“We do not have a specific investment policy towards Israeli companies, but all companies we invest in have to comply with our internal guidelines for responsible investments”, Robert Bruun Mikkelstrup, assistant director for Investment Risk and Implementation in Dansk Bank, says in an e-mail.
Neither Nordea has ended their investments in the banks, but they have initiated a dialogue.
“We have been in dialogue with the relevant banks about their investments in occupied territories, and we will include aspects of Human Rights Watch’ framework in our future dialogue with the banks. Depending on the results of this dialogue, we will consider our future investments”, states both Nordea Liv & Pension and Nordea Invest.
