PepsiCo India & Fernandez Victory !

[cd@xxxxxxxxxx]

Subject: Re: PepsiCo India & Fernandez Victory !!!

This is a multi-part message in MIME format.

--------------2C6648F6C0B
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

Good luck in contacting Congress for S 1511!

--------------2C6648F6C0B
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Content-Disposition: inline; filename="INDOKFC.TXT"

Dear Burma Readers, 

Our friends in New Delhi have annonced that reelection of the veteran human rights leader George Fernandez to the Indian Parliament. His long campaign against Pepsi in India will now not go unchallenged. Read the following press report from Reuters. Chris Sinclair's PepsiCo has  virtually destroyed the production and market of Indian home brands.

" ..... Surprisingly, Guruswamy signalled support for Kentucky Fried Chicken, the PepsisCo-owned U.S. restaurant chain. Other BJP leaders have picked them out for condemnation as frivolities unneeded in a developing economy. He said KFC would create jobs. "The chicken is yours, the oil is
yours, the batter is yours." KFC also faces opposition from socialists who say it will divert
scarce grains away from human consumption...... "

The battle against the cultural exploitation of PepsiCo in India and Burma continues. Please send you heart-felt support to Mr. George Fernandez. Certainly, while preoccupied with his election campaign, George Fernandez is heartened by the efforts in the United States by the FBC and its supporters in restraining PepsiCo exploitation  in Burma.

         tom!absl@xxxxxxxxxxxx

Again, let me reaffirm the fact that Daw Aung San Suu Kyi made headline news tonight on national french prime time television in her struggle for a democratic and free Burma
Dawn Star Paris


Headline: India's BJP puts conditions on foreign brandnames 
Keywords: India, election, Foreign brandnames, PepsiCo, Kentucky Fried Chicken 
Date: May 12 1996
Source: Reuter, INND
Section: Asianet
Rubrique:India 

By Narayanan Madhavan
NEW DELHI - Hindu nationalist BJP, seeking the call to form India's new government after indecisive elections, frowns on foreign brandnames but would welcome them if they can create jobs and add
value, a party ideologue said.

 "We want to be a producer, not a market," said Mohan Guruswamy, a member of the Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) economic affairs committee, told Reuters at the weekend. "They (foreign brands) will create oligopolies here (if given a free hand)," he said at the party headquarters in New Delhi. "We want them to
earn profits, not just take it away." The BJP, emerging with its allies as the largest single group with
some 180 seats in the 545-member parliament, says it can form a government
with support from regional groups.
    
 It went to President Shankar Dayal Sharma on Saturday to stake its claim to power. So did the leftist National Front-Left Front (NF-LF) alliance and a decision on who will be given the chance to form a
government was still two or three days away. But Guruswamy offered new details on the economic policies of the BJP, which says its main focus is boosting Indian industry, not opening up the domestic market to foreign competition before Indian firms are ready to meet it.But it says it welcomes foreign investment in key sectors like infrastructure and high technology.

Foreign brandnames were welcome if they accompanied large manufacturing capacities, Guruswamy said. 

"Once we decide (to have them) they will have a freedom of capacities," he said.

"They want you to be a cheap manufacturing base," he said. "We don't accept the view that what is good for the company is good for the country." The BJP did not favour import of completely knocked down (CKD) or semi
knocked down (SKD) kits for assembly and sale, Guruswamy said. "This CKD/SKD nonsense must stop."

The Harvard-educated ideologue said the BJP favoured South Korean and Japanese models, with government working closely with domestic firms. Stress would be laid on research and development for Indian products,
Guruswamy said.

 "We will give some support to Indian manufacturers to promote brands,"Guruswamy said, particularly lauding India's Tata Tea, the world's biggest tea company. Guruswamy said BJP would prefer Indian brands for India-made tea rather than western names like Brooke Bond, a brand owned by Hindustan Lever, part of the Unilever group. If refrigerators were made in India for export, the BJP would expect them to carry Indian brandnames like Godrej, rather than western tags like Whirlpool, he said.

 Surprisingly, Guruswamy signalled support for Kentucky Fried Chicken, the PepsisCo-owned U.S. restaurant chain. Other BJP leaders have picked them out for condemnation as frivolities unneeded in a developing economy. He said KFC would create jobs. "The chicken is yours, the oil is
yours, the batter is yours." KFC also faces opposition from socialists who say it will divert
scarce grains away from human consumption.

 Guruswamy said a BJP government would encourage foreign firms to lend money to Indian firms rather than buy into them because it would give the government a measure of control. Such control was necessary because even a private firm's debt was part of India's external debt -- now some $99 billion -- and the BJP was
concerned about it, Guruswamy said.

Foreign investors must add to India's foreign exchange earnings, Guruswamy said. Rao lifted controls on the rupee in 1992 and allowed the market to set its rate. "The BJP still sees foreign exchange as a scarce commodity," he said. "You have to keep the integrity of your currency."


--------------2C6648F6C0B--