Action Alert UNICEF McDonald's partnership

The Action Alert has been a big success and messages were sent to UNICEF's
Executive Director Carol Bellamy from all over the world.

There is an indication that UNICEF is reassessing its partnership with McDonald's.

In this critical time it is important to keep the pressure up and to let UNICEF know how people feel about this very unfortunate McDonald's-UNICEF alliance.

We call on those of you who have not yet written to Ms. Bellamy, to please do so immediately.

Just copy the letter, or write your own letter, sign it and send it to Ms Bellamy at UNICEF (her address is UNICEF House, 3 UN Plaza, New York, NY 10017, USA. Her fax number is: fax: +1 212 326 7758. Her e-mail address is: cbellamy@unicef.org). And please forward a copy to Kenny Bruno at the Alliance for a Corporate-free United Nations, kenny@earthrights.org and to info@gifa.org.

Thank you for lending your support to this campaign.

believe it or not an actual McDonalds advert

November 20 marks the thirteenth anniversary of the United Nations adoption of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which took place on November 20, 1989. Today, please consider participating in this Action Alert proposed by the Alliance for a Corporate-free U.N.

ACTION ALERT

BIG MAC ALLIANCE - GOOD OR BAD FOR KIDS?

Every year, November 20 commemorates the anniversary of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. On November 20, 2002, the World Child Rights Day will be rebranded into "McDonalds's World Children's Day", to celebrate the Alliance between UNICEF, which promotes the best interests of the child, and McDonald's. There have already been several attempts by leading NGOs working on child health and nutrition and citizens' coalitions to persuade UNICEF's Executive Director Carol Bellamy to cancel the partnership with MacDonald's.

Despite petitions and letters sent to UNICEF, the agency is going ahead with the Alliance with McDonald's, and maybe next year will evaluate the deal. Your letters can make a difference in persuading UNICEF to reconsider this partnership and cancel it - thus truly acting in the best interests of children.

McDonald's is a worldwide company selling highly popular - and highly unhealthy - hamburgers and other fatty fast foods. It is required by law to dedicate itself to making money.
UNICEF, the United Nations Children's Fund, also operates worldwide. It works "to save children's lives and build children's futures" and is dedicated to the well-being, including good health and nutrition, of children everywhere.

Now UNICEF and McDonald's have agreed, so UNICEF says, "to team up to raise money on behalf of the world's children".
This unlikely, if not unhealthy partnership - a kind of Big Mac Alliance - includes money-raising stunts in 121 countries. It is to be launched on November 2O, 2002, now to be called "McDonald's World Children's Day". And the money-raising stunts? In China, for example, children who buy a Big Mac get "exclusive" access to an Internet concert, with a portion of the proceeds going to UNICEF. And in other countries, "UNICEF offices will work directly with McDonald's restaurants...to raise funds and awareness for children's causes". So, does UNICEF now endorse fast food - or help McDonald's sell products that makes kids overweight? The answer in both cases, says UNICEF, is a categorical NO!

We don't believe the Big Mac Alliance will be good for kids - or, in the long run, for UNICEF. Nor do we think that pursuit of private profit and promotion of children's well-being go well together. In both cases our answer is also a categorical NO!

The bizarre nature of McDonald's alliance with UNICEF is highlighted by the billboard from Austria and Italy shown below, which equates eating a hamburger with breastfeeding.
Is eating a hamburger really as natural and health-promoting as
breastfeeding? Can you imagine an image less compatible with the
mission of UNICEF, with its history of promoting breastfeeding?
Three years ago, in 1999, UNICEF's Executive Director, Carol Bellamy, warned that "it is dangerous to assume that the goals of the private sector are somehow synonymous with those of the United Nations, because most emphatically they are not. " Has Carol Bellamy changed her mind? If so, why? If you agree with our request to Carol Bellamy to annul the Big Mac Alliance, then please write to her (and if you wish use the sample letter below). Her address is UNICEF House, 3 UN Plaza, New York, NY 10017, USA. Her fax number is: fax: +1 212 326 7758. Her e-mail address
is: cbellamy@unicef.org,
And please forward a copy to Kenny Bruno at the Alliance for a
Corporate-free United Nations kenny@earthrights.org and/or to
info@gifa.org. For IBFAN-GIFA's full postal address please see below.

Link to sample letter to UNICEF

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